Van Helsing 3: The Fallen
by Beguile
Summary: Gabriel Van Helsing is sent back to Transylvania to destroy the great Elizabeth Bathery. Meanwhile, his past catches up with him and forgiveness is offered. But nothing comes without a price, and even the angels aren't philanthropists.
1. The Nightmares are Getting Worse

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts pertaining to the movie Van Helsing in this story are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur writing effort. There was no money made off the writing of this story.

Author's Notes: I'm BACK! This is amazing. Thanks to everyone who read and or reviewed Van Helsing 2: Shards of Avalon. I appreciated all the feedback. I'd also like to thank my beta, Grissom, who worked very hard on making sure that this was free of spelling and grammatical errors. I really appreciate it!

To everyone who is new to my stories: This is a sequel to Van Helsing 2: Shards of Avalon. I strongly urge you to read that story first before tackling this one since many things have changed for the monster hunter and his friar friend.

As a final note, I have paired Van Helsing with Mina Harker. If you don't like Van Helsing/OC pairings (even though I hardly think Mina Harker is an OC, even when you consider the liberties I have taken with her character), I would steer away from this story as well. Anyone who has a problem with this, DON'T SAY I DIDN'T WARN YOU. If you have a problem with my insertion, take it up through an e-mail, and don't poison my review page with your comments about Mary-Sues.

* * *

Van Helsing 3: The Fallen

Chapter 1: The Nightmares Are Getting Worse

A loud explosion erupted through the Knights of the Holy Order's Headquarters. Every friar, monk, priest, and cardinal jumped in surprise, throwing dirty looks at the area it had come from. No one was surprised. It came from Friar Carl's table. The smallish and bumbling friar had been experimenting with Greek fire again, testing his new device which could, in his meticulously chosen words, could actually 'throw flame'.

"It's quite simple, really," he had tried to explain to Gabriel Van Helsing. The monster hunter cocked a brow.

"I thought there was nothing simple about you Carl," he replied jokingly.

"You might be surprised," Carl said, moving through the many devices he was in the process of inventing or hadn't invented yet and were simply 'saving them for a rainy day' so to speak. "It involves the same type of projection device as your cross bow only instead of shooting arrows this shoots a stream of Greek fire at a desired target and..."

"I know, I know..." Gabriel said. "Charred werewolf. How incredibly charming Carl."  
  
"I thought you'd enjoy that," he replied.

The rest of the Order heard nothing else on the subject, except of course for the occasional explosions that could be traced back to the Friar's work table without much difficulty. They thought perhaps they would be used to them by now. Carl was certainly famous for his explosions. His inventions always seemed to have something to do with projectiles and flames, two things that were dangerous when mixed with a man like Carl. Carl was one of the few scientists in the Order who actually enjoyed not having any eyebrows. "That way they never get burned off," he told Van Helsing in one of the monster hunter's earlier years. Scientists were rare enough in the Order as it is. Most Friars, Monks, Priests, and any powerful religious figure for that matter would find the devotion to science highly sacrilege. But Carl saw it as a different way to honour God, and several times, forgot completely about God and devoted himself to the ways of the scientists before him.

Carl was small, it was true. He was shorter than most his age, and he was fairly young. It was unfortunate that he had reached his full height. However, what he lacked in height he made up for easily in what most of the Order would call insanity, but what he called genius.

His curly orange hair was cropped short, as was custom. If it were any longer it too would be singed off in his explosions. His eyes were blue and his face was boyish although his intelligence proved otherwise. As much as the Order wanted to admit that Carl was a menace to all things living, they realized how much they needed him whenever Gabriel went on a mission.

And there was the one fact that Carl was the only man Gabriel trusted, besides maybe Jinette, and even trusting Jinette was a little out of character for the monster hunter.

The explosion that issued forth that day was larger than anything they had experienced before, even in the past. Carl pulled off his goggles and apologized, as usual. He ignored the death threats by muttering that no one truly respected a true genius at work. He turned back to the table and looked at the contraption. _The design_, his mind suggested. Carl shook his head. In his opinion, the design was flawless. _The mechanics_, his mind asked. Carl shook his head again and rubbed the grime away from his chin. He couldn't find anything wrong with the mechanics.

Except that the Greek fire had a nasty habit of exploding before even leaving the barrel of the weapon.

_Well if you got the enemy to wield it the weapon would work perfectly,_ he thought, tapping his badly bandaged fingers on the table, ignoring the pain that shot up his knuckles and into his hand. _But that's just a silly idea. Van Helsing is more likely to part with his soul than a weapon._

Carl picked up the nearly destroyed weapon another time and groaned before tossing it into his growing scrap heap. The twisted pieces of metal resembled some kind of unholy demon now, after a week of working constantly, grounded in the Vatican while Gabriel whiled away doing whatever a monster hunter did when he wasn't hunting monsters. Since returning from their mission with Morgan le Fey, there had been a few local hunts and several out of the country. Business was slow, which for the Vatican was good news. It meant that Gabriel was slowly working out the evil in the world. It meant that the constant explosions coming from Carl's work table were truly worth all the racing pulses and aching fingertips the Friar and his 'fellow' workers had to put up with.

"This good for nothing..." He mouthed the string of curses with his head hung low, just in case someone could read lips. Van Helsing had told him his cursing was getting better since they had returned from England and even taught him some new ones. It was a small, overlooked retaliation against Jinette, and Carl knew how much Gabriel loved small, overlooked victories. He loved them just as much as he hated large, explosive victories, ones that usually resulted in making his criminal record even more colourful. "If that's possible..." He muttered under his breath, thinking out loud as he set about making another weapon, starting again from scratch.

"Friar Carl." Jinette's commanding voice summoned him from his thoughts. Carl looked up, his face still covered in the black residue from the explosion - everywhere except large circles around his eyes as if he were an inversed raccoon. Jinette was not a tall man, or a proud man, but he certainly knew how to run the Order effectively. He was completely bald, a fact he tried to hide with his small, flattened red hat and his small frame was well hidden under his baggy and loose red Cardinal robes. The short Friar nodded. It was his only response. "Did Van Helsing say anything to you about leaving the headquarters?"

Carl didn't move. He just shook his head.

"I would imagine he is in his apartment, Cardinal," he began, his voice wavering a little. Jinette didn't seem to notice.

"I have checked there," he began, "And in the training chambers and throughout the rest of the Order. I have half of the Order looking around the city for him and have so far turned up nothing. Perhaps you could to tell me where he has gone?"  
  
"I can't tell you what I don't know." Carl replied innocently. "I knew he was here this morning."  
  
"Morning has come and gone." Jinette said sternly. "It is nearing evening and something has come to my attention. Did he tell you nothing about where he was going?"  
Carl shook his head, unable to say another word without giving away his lie. The Cardinal's eyes narrowed menacingly, and he seemed to peer directly into Carl's soul and see everything.

But Jinette just tightened his lips and simply said, "I think he is taking advantage of this 'vacation'. And if I discover that you are lying for him Carl, there will be consequences."

Carl could only bite his lips together to keep himself from saying anything incriminating. The Cardinal leaned back.

"Tell me the instant you see him." He said. "This is urgent."

Carl managed to say, "Yes, Cardinal," without sounding too conspicuous. The Cardinal eventually walked away, looking around the heads in the Headquarters for any sign of the large fedora Van Helsing had permanently perched on his head. Carl imagined that in the list of important things in Van Helsing's life, a weapon came first and then came his hat. After that, the rest was just icing on the cake.

"Good Lord, Gabriel you are going to be the death of me," he said, making sure the Cardinal was out his sights before he crept away from his table and fled from the Headquarters. He knew exactly where Van Helsing was. And he knew exactly what he was doing there.

* * *

Mina Harker turned down the offer from the Headmaster of the school to walk her home, telling him that it was inappropriate for them to be seen together in front of her husband. He assured her his interest was entirely professional, but she knew better. She knew he was single and quite attractive, and that a life with a Headmaster of a school would be a far better match than the one she had chosen. But a year of Gabriel Van Helsing had made the professional types seem dull and unattractive in every sense of the words. 

Her husband had been a lie, and she had maintained it well since she arrived in Rome a year ago. Her real husband, Jonathan Harker, had died several years ago in her old home in London. Now, she was married to a sickened doctor named Henry who had fallen ill at his practice in London. The physician demanded that they get out of the city and she had chosen to come to Rome, believing that 'being this close to God may speed his recovery'. The lie was starting to wear thin as neighbours were beginning to notice the dark stranger who was always visiting and the fact that they had never seen her husband actually arrive in the apartment at all.

She lived in a small home not far from the school she worked at. The female schoolmistress was hardly at home in a country that was still living under the rule of the Catholic Church. Women were not smiled upon, least in the work force. Her ruse about her sick husband gave her a slight amount of pity though, since her dear husband was too weak to even stand and walk around, let alone work.

"Home sweet home..." She had tried to convince herself, but the home was hardly the size of the house she had once lived in London. It was smaller and cramped with all of her things but it was nonetheless comfortable, just the sort of place a school teacher could be happy.

Mina looked up and down the street carefully before opening the door. She couldn't see her dark stranger anywhere. He usually came to her when the Vatican bored him, and all that week he had been coming in the evening, just after the Cardinal stopped looking even for a moment, and he rode to her on horseback, her knight in shining armor as it were. There was no sign of him tonight though. She sighed and walked into her house, locking and bolting the door behind her.

Stacks of books and boxes that still remained unpacked were crammed into the small living room. Beyond that was her bedroom and her kitchen and that was all. The stairs to the upper levels of the apartment were on the side of the building. Her neighbours were artists. The man enjoyed painting naked, especially in the summer, while his spouse (or partner, she wasn't entirely sure) posed in much the same manner, her dark curls moving over her olive skin and covering most of her private areas. He once asked Mina to pose for him, but she had graciously refused again, on the grounds that her husband would not approve. He rolled his eyes and shook his head.

"Your beauty is being wasted," he said, his dark eyes gleaming. "If you change your mind..."  
Mina smiled.

"I would never change my mind about such a thing." She said. The man shrugged and went back upstairs.

She set down her bag on the couch and removed her coat and scarf. Winter was coming back again, even though it was hardly evident. In London the streets would have been covered in a light dusting of snow as carolers sang songs of Christ's birthday.

Italy was no different. They too were preparing for the birth of their King. They did it respectfully though, as if everything tied back to the Church.

When the oil lamps were lit and the house was flooded with some orange light she heard the footsteps upstairs. Mina shook her head as the woman laughed and summoned her husband to her in Italian, speaking to him in a loud voice of all the things they were to get up to tonight. Mina escaped to the bedroom to drown them out. With the door closed, she could no longer hear the sounds of the couple above her, but she could hear the sound of footsteps coming to a halt in the dark recesses of her room.

A small smile came across her face. She set the lamp down on the desk and crossed her arms.

"You came?" She asked the faceless silhouette in the shadows of the bedroom. The figure nodded and took a step forward towards the light from behind the shadow of the wardrobe. The face of Gabriel Van Helsing stared back at her, glinted with the glow of the lamp, his eyes shimmering in the dark.

"I came," he told her, as if it weren't evident by his presence. "The Cardinal wanted me to train. I wanted to come here."

Mina smiled softly and took a step towards him.

"How long do you have tonight?" She asked him.

"Carl said he would come and get me is anything came up." Gabriel replied, taking a step towards her. The two were at odds with each other as their eyes ate away at the other's flesh, digging deep into their bodies. "But I highly doubt anything will."

"What makes you say that?" she asked him, taking another step. It was always cautious in the beginning, as if the two were starting over night after night. She was just a foot from him. One more step and they would be face to face.

"I've been here every night since I came back from Spain," he said, hesitating before taking another step forward. His face was inches from hers now and he was looking her straight in the eye. "Plus, the company seems far more interesting here than there."

"I'll have to tell Carl you said that," she told him, smiling coyly.

"Oh, will you?" He asked her. Mina nodded and placed a hand on his shoulder. Gabriel placed his hand on hers. "I don't think you will."  
"And what makes you think that?" Mina asked him.

"People call intimidating." He said. Mina laughed and shook her head, leaning into his embrace with her head on his shoulder. It was nights like these that made up for all the absences she had to endure over the year of her move to Rome. Gabriel would wrap her in his arms and suddenly everything was right with the world.

Until, of course, duty called. And then Mina would be second to a stranger.

* * *

_The storm clouds thickened around the city, and Gabriel stared off into them, unafraid of what surprises the thunder storms brought. He knew better than to think this was coincidence. Michael had not been happy with him before the incident and was not happy with him now. He showed no sign of ever getting over the recent offence committed by Gabriel._

_The winged figure in the clouds was larger than he, but it was all in the wing span. Gabriel could see that the body was smaller and human and could not compare to his own. The large spear he held in his hand seemed to dare Gabriel to attack without a weapon. It threatened to tilt forward at any moment and pierce his chest, running him right through._

_"You have disobeyed for the last time, Gabriel," the winged creature said. His face was unseen in the darkness. Even when the lightning crackled through the clouds Gabriel could not get a clear view of the face that stared at him with a deadly glare in his eyes._

_"I have not disobeyed," Gabriel shouted back to the creature. _

_"You have disobeyed!" the winged creature shot back. "You said it was the last time, Gabriel. You said it was the last time almost four centuries ago and here you are, doing it again. You gave me your word it would never happen again!"_

_"And what am I to do?" Gabriel shouted with a flap of his own wings, holding him in the air. The lightning flickered again as the storm drew closer. Rain pelted against his bare flesh but he was not cold. He was not hot. It was odd to feel none of these things at one particular moment in time. "Am I to simply forsake the calls of the living and only hear the sounds of the dead?"  
"It is your calling, Gabriel," the winged man replied. "It is your job. This is what you were created to do."_

_"I don't believe that," he challenged the creature. The creature in front of him gave a flap of his wings in Gabriel's direction as a sign of his anger. "I don't believe that this was all I was meant to do."  
The spear vanished as the thunder boomed. Lightning bolts struck closely by the two, and yet the face remained a mystery still. _

_"Then perhaps your sentence will help you find that other calling, Gabriel," the man said. With a flap of his mighty wings he was speeding in Gabriel's direction. Gabriel turned and moved past the man with surprising agility, just dodging the man's body with his movements. It wasn't long though, before his 'enemy' swerved back and tackled him, grabbing hold of his wings._

_Gabriel threw his opponent off him and into the air. He swung back around and kicked the angel back. The man twisted back and flew back to Gabriel once again, this time striking him with enough force to knock the wind out of him. It did not, however. It simply made Gabriel go still for a moment, enough for the man to reach back for his wings again._

_Gabriel grabbed the smaller man and tried to pull him from his body. The man however dug his shoulder into Van Helsing's gut, making his body go rigid. His opponent swung around to his back and firmly planted both feet on Gabriel's lower back while his hands gripped the wings at their joint._

_"I hope you will learn your lesson, Gabriel," the man said and started to pull._

_Only pain followed. And then there was the sensation of being released to the waiting ground below._

* * *

Gabriel snapped awake, sitting up immediately in bed. His pulse had quickened for the first time in his known life and he was hyperventilating, another unnatural event that occurred only after the nightmares. Only his memories could frighten him to the point that he couldn't function. 

It took him a moment to realize where he was. He found the small bedroom filled with bookcases and a single wardrobe and desk and immediately knew to look at the other side of the bed. Mina lay on top of the covers in nothing but her underclothes, still sleeping. He looked down at her pale flesh, to her overturned wrist with the piece of the Excalibur sheath buried under the skin. He wiped the sweat from his brow, taking a deep breath of the cool night air that flowed inside from the slightly open window. It chilled him to the bone even though the temperature was moderate even in December.

His shivers made Mina wake up. She blinked and quickly came back to the world of the living and frantically moved for the window.  
"Sorry." She said, shutting it quickly before closing the curtains once more. "You were a little warm before you fell asleep so I opened it." Gabriel nodded, saying nothing. Mina was always trying to mother him in the small sense of the word and the big sense. She was handy to have around whenever he needed to be bandaged up or needed a place to go MIA for a few hours. It just got irritating that she would dote over him as if her were a child. _And that didn't sound immature, did it Gabriel? _his mind asked him. He told it to shut up.

Mina's eyes narrowed as she peered into the darkness of the room, lit only by the dim lamp by the bed. She walked back to Gabriel and placed both hands on his cheeks, feeling the sweat drip from his brow. Her cool fingertips made the shivers intensify and his teeth chatter.

"God, Gabriel, you're burning up," she said as she moved to the small basin of water she kept next to the lamp. He couldn't even protest as she dipped the cloth into the cool water and squeezed out the excess.

"I'm fine," he finally said, but she hushed him quickly.

"Don't," she said.

"Don't what?"

"Don't say you're fine," she said, running it over the back of his neck. "I know you're not." He rolled his eyes and relaxed against her shoulder, taking a deep breath of the faint smell of her perfume before opening his eyes again.

"The nightmares..." he said. "They're getting worse."

"How bad?" she asked with genuine interest or concern. Gabriel thought it might be both.

"I can't see faces," he said as she moved the cloth over his brow again. "Just a storm and then a battle, and then I fall onto the Vatican step below." Mina dipped the cloth back into the water when it had become as warm as his flesh. She ran her fingers through his hair.

"The angels?" she asked. He nodded. Mina fell silent again, setting the cloth on his bare neck and pressing it close to his skin, holding it there for a moment. Gabriel sat up, taking the cloth under his own hand and hanging his head as the dizziness faded.

"I'm ready to give up my old life." he confessed. He had been considering it ever since Mina had come to Italy with him. He was always called away to something else while she spent her time living a lie for him.

Mina watched him pull the cloth from his neck. She sighed.

"But...?" she asked, knowing it was coming up after he had said that. Gabriel shook his head.

"I get the feeling someone doesn't want me too," he confessed. Mina looked away. "Ever since I started thinking about leaving they've been getting worse. And they leave me like this when I wake." He was growing frustrated. She could tell by the way his face flushed at the crushing defeat that was beginning to settle in on him. She ran a comforting hand over his arm and lowered her eyes.

"Lay down," she told him.

"I should go..."

"Lay down," she said, hushing him again. Gabriel didn't want to protest. He did as she requested and lay back down on the bed, the wet cloth still attached to the back of his neck as it cooled the fever inside him. "You should stop thinking about it." Mina kissed him on the forehead, trying to read his temperature and show affection at the same time. "Just get some sleep."

"I shouldn't..." He still said, even as his eyes closed again. The feeling of Mina's fingers smoothing along his cheek and sound of her breathing calmed him down. Gabriel found sleep within moments, but was not at peace for long. There was a tapping on the window, causing him to shake himself awake. Mina was already at the window, holding the lamp. By the time she had opened it, Gabriel already knew who was outside.

"Can you two take your hands off each other for a moment to answer the door?" Carl demanded angrily.

"Sorry Carl." Mina smiled and invited him in through the window. By the time she had turned Gabriel was already up and dressing. He pulled on his grey sweater over his bare chest and his coat over that. She said nothing of his current condition. Nearly all physical traces of the fever were gone, but there was still that glazed look in his eyes. "He was just leaving."

Gabriel pulled his hat on, glancing at Mina.

"I'm sorry," he said, not wanting to get overly sentimental in front of Carl. Mina just nodded.

"I'll see you when you get back," she said.

* * *

As always, I love constructive criticism, I hate flames. If you feel the need to personally attack me about my writing, please e-mail me at I don't have a lot of respect for people who hide behind a computer screen, but if you truly feel the need to say something, e-mail me instead of tainting the review board with your insults. 


	2. Something Wicked This Way Comes

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts in this story pertaining to Van Helsing are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur writing effort. No money was made off the writing of this story.

* * *

Chapter 2: Something Wicked This Way Comes

Carl had reacted quite well to the prospect of Gabriel and Mina becoming 'involved'. At first he had said nothing. Gabriel had assumed he didn't realize it, but he was later proven wrong when Carl showed up at Mina's home and found them together. The small headed friar popped through the window in her bedroom, catching them mid-kiss.

"Carl..." Mina had said, immediately taking her arm off Van Helsing's back and separating herself from him. Gabriel was still staring in shock at the friar's head poking through the window.

He went still for a moment as if absorbing the idea of them as a couple. Then, without another word, he told Gabriel he was needed back at the Vatican and pulling his head back out through the window. Gabriel was silent, watching as Mina blushed and laughed.

"Do you think he'll tell the Cardinal?" she asked with another laugh. Gabriel shook his head.

"Not if he doesn't want the Cardinal to find out about all his relationships," he replied, getting up and off the bed. Mina pulled the sheets up and around her body, still blushing bright red.

"You really should have told her to buy a house closer to the Vatican," Carl stated, awkwardly riding next to Gabriel on his small brown pony. Gabriel glanced in his friend's direction as Carl continued. "The less time I spend on a horse, the better."

"Come now, Carl," Gabriel said, kicking the horse for a little more speed. Carl was starting to struggle to keep up. "It does people good to get outside. You don't expect to spend the rest of your life behind brick walls do you?"

"I should spend my life behind brick walls," Carl replied, attempting to keep up with the hunter. The stubby legs of his pony could not manage such a task. "I could avoid the troubles of being dragged cross-country, poked with electric cattle prods, nearly struck by lightning, thrown, tossed, and hit...and did I mention being dropped from the tallest tower in Morgan's castle?"  
Gabriel shook his head in exasperation. _He still remembers all of these things?_

"What doesn't kill you...," he began.

"Just makes you live in fear," Carl finished the statement. His sardonic humour made Gabriel smile. It made life easier to have such conversations with Carl. They made the pains of the hunt and the difficulties of living a double life so much easier. "I can't think of anything more dangerous than being dragged along on a hunt."

"You can't learn everything from books, Carl," Gabriel said. "Eventually you have to learn things from experience."

"There are some things that should never be experienced," Carl said, looking at the cobblestone pavement as they rode along. "The Lord of all Vampires and the Queen of the Faeries..."

"Perhaps I'll drag you on the next journey Jinette sends me on, just to add more to that experience list," Gabriel said, amused with Carl's tone. He kicked his horse and took off in a canter down the street. It took Carl a moment to realize what Gabriel had said.

"What do you mean you'll drag me out again? Van Helsing?" He kicked his pony hard, trying to catch up, but ended up trailing just after the monster hunter, unable to catch up.

Gabriel always entered through St. Peter's Square. He had examined every inch of the interior of Vatican City from Borgia and Belvedere Courtyards to the tomb of St. Peter himself. St. Peter's Square always gave him shivers when he rode inside it, especially now that his nightmares had steadily worsened. He remembered falling down through the pouring rain and striking the ground not far from where he left his horse standing when he dismounted.

He looked over the steps of the Square and swallowed hard. Carl didn't notice his apprehension as he dropped off his horse and walked into the Basilica.

"Are you coming?" he asked, waking Gabriel from his vigil.

He nodded to Carl, answering him with a small, "Yes..." Carl started up the steps, inadvertently causing another memory for Van Helsing. He remembered the sounds of footsteps, the ragged breathing, the voices...

He wiped the sweat off his forehead and started after Carl. His boots made a small tapping noise on the marble steps as he ascended, staying close behind Carl.

Gabriel found that his head started to hurt the second the light from the Basilica hit his eyes. Everything was too loud or too bright at that moment in time. The chanting made his head ache. The light made his eyes water. Everything just added to how terrible he was starting to feel.

_"You shouldn't do this to yourself Gabriel," Mina said, running her fingers along his cheek as they lay together on her small, single bed. He turned his dark eyes towards her, staring at the top of her head as she rested it on his bandaged chest. She was careful not to set it on his bruised ribs, recently injured by the gargoyles atop Notre Dame Cathedral._

_"What would you have me do?" he asked her softly, tenderly, running his fingers over her back unconsciously, feeling the groves of her spine under his fingertips. He tried to lighten the mood, laughing a little. "Lay here with you forever?"  
  
"Don't joke about such things..." she replied lazily, staring at his bandaged chest. "I could make you stay, if I truly wanted."_

_"So you don't want me then?" He asked, pretending to be angry. "Fine, I suppose I'll just ride back to the Vatican then..."_

_"I didn't know you had a flare for melodrama," she said, snuggling closer. Gabriel swallowed hard. He wanted to stay forever._

Gabriel was half expecting Jinette to be standing there with his foot tapping, his arms crossed and his face contorted in anger. Strangely, the Basilica was only filled with the sound of the chanting and not the enraged shouting of his 'employer'. It was deserted except for him and Carl. His eyes narrowed. Something wasn't right.

"Is everything alright?" Carl asked him, noticing at last that the hunter wasn't moving. His body was still as he looked around the room, searching for something that he could feel but not see. Gabriel sniffed the air. Something was definitely wrong, he just didn't know what.

"Wait here," he said. Gabriel walked towards the confession box briskly.

"What's going on? Van Helsing?" Carl wasn't sure whether to listen to Gabriel or not. He took a step or two forward as Gabriel threw open the confessional.

"Bless me Father for I have sinned," he said quickly, waiting for some smartass reply from the Cardinal. There was nothing. He pounded on the window and still heard nothing from inside the other box.

Jinette wasn't there. He couldn't have been.

Gabriel stopped for a moment. He knew something was wrong now. Jinette always kept watch in the confessional, especially if he were waiting for the monster hunter to return. He pounded on the back wall, trying to dislodge the mechanism that kept the Headquarters closed from the general public. It was locked tight. He groaned and pounded it with his shoulder, just as it lifted slowly.

He stared at it. "Did I do that?" He said to no one in particular. He glanced over and into Jinette's side of the confessional and found Carl still holding the lever in his left hand.

"It's always that hard way with you, isn't it?" the friar asked, stepping down into the long staircase beneath Vatican City. "You can't just find the lever to make things work, you have to blow something up or shoot something wildly or..." His list went on and on. Gabriel couldn't bear to smile though. He would have normally. Listening to Carl's long and drawn out lists of his faults was one of his favourite past times. It kept him sane. But now was not the time for humour. He could sense something down there, and he quickly grabbed Carl's shoulder and halted him from walking any further into the Headquarters.

"What in the name of God...?"

Gabriel put a finger to his lips, silencing Carl immediately. The friar stared fearfully into the hunter's face.

"There's something down here," Gabriel whispered. Carl was silent, watching as Gabriel pulled his gun from under his coat. The hunter cocked the weapon before walking down the rest of the steps, swinging out and into the open with his gun outstretched.

The sight astounded him. It was as if the apocalypse had struck while he and Carl were gone. Every table was tipped over. Broken glass covered the floor. The tiny shards sparkled in the light like millions of stars. The coloured liquids that flowed around them made a replica of the Northern Lights at his feet. Metal was scattered carelessly in twisted fragments as if ripped apart by a supernatural force.

Then there were the bodies, piled together, some still twitching and convulsing, each bearing a pair of puncture wounds on their throat.

Gabriel felt like he couldn't breathe for the first time in his life.

* * *

Carl came down the stairs after Gabriel, discovering the Headquarters in shambles. He stared off in the direction of his own table, finding it too had been vandalized in the same manner as the others. The pile of metal cylinders he had been using to make his 'flame projecting device' were used as weapons and he found them sticking out of the corpses of his coworkers.

Carl couldn't breathe. He took a step back in disgust and nearly started vomiting.

The sound of cold laughter reached his ears from above. Carl's eyes followed Van Helsing's gun as he searched the dark shadows of the ceiling for the culprits. There were the sounds of wings flapping and the laughter quieted.

"It appears as if we have missed two," a voice said from the dark recesses of the ceiling. The echoing made it hard to find where it was coming from. Gabriel scanned through the shadows with his expert gaze. The voice laughed again. "Franc! Killian! Kill them."

Gabriel already knew the voice was female. It was an alto voice, low and dramatic, with a heavy Romanian accent. The memory of Anna made him shiver.

The wall slid shut at the top of the stairs, activating the intricate locking system. Without Jinette, he and Carl were unable to escape the headquarters that way. Gabriel looked back through the chaos and grabbed Carl's shoulder.

"Carl," he began, keeping his weapon trained on the ceiling, "RUN!"

The two took off into the mess of bodies, glass, metal and wood. Carl slid on his robes and had to stop for a moment to grab the skirt of his robe before running again. There was the sound of wings as one of the creatures from the ceiling descended upon the two.

"DUCK!" Gabriel pushed Carl down to the ground and fired at the winged creature that flew towards them. His body was milky white with flesh that resembled leather. Gabriel could count out the ribs in its chest without much difficulty. Its wings were made of the same material, long and sleek. The resemblance to one of Dracula's brides was astounding.

The bullets struck his body and threw the vampire back into the darkness of the ceiling. Gabriel grabbed Carl by the scruff of the neck and pushed him further into the headquarters, moving away from the hissing and flapping coming from the ceiling. He kept the friar's head low as they moved in the direction of Carl's table, and Gabriel's second priority, his weapons.

"Here!" Carl said, handing Gabriel a silver stake. He always had a stash hidden within his thick robes. Gabriel took the stake and watched the shadows for movement, finding nothing. Not a trace of movement or glimpse of the monsters above.

Carl raced forward and grabbed hold of the crossbow from the floor. He shouted for Van Helsing just as the vampire swooped back down. Gabriel had fired before it could come within a meter of Carl. The vampire was thrown backwards and crashed into the opposite wall. Carl tossed Van Helsing the crossbow. Gabriel had it in his hands just as a second vampire came down upon him from behind. The hunter swung around and pulled the trigger.

Nothing happened.

He ducked in enough time to just narrowly missing the vampire's outstretched claws. Once he was turned around he tried the trigger again.

"Carl," he began, "It's not working!"

"I'm having a little trouble remedying that right now, Van Helsing!" He shouted as he ran from another attempt on his life. The vampire was the same as the last, but bore a long scar that moved down its back between its wings. Carl frantically tossed a small glass orb over his shoulder which hit the vampire in the chest. A shrill scream filled the room, making Carl grab his ears in pain. Gabriel hit the crossbow a few times and took aim once more, pulling the trigger. He was happy when a barrage of arrows started flying through the air, striking the fallen vampire with amazing accuracy.

The body struck the ground and convulsed once more before turning into nothing but dust and ash.

The other vampire had recovered from being thrown into the wall by Gabriel's bullets and had since started to fly towards Carl once more. He was struck with arrows, on finding its way to his un-beating heart.

There was silence suddenly. It came as such a shock to Gabriel. His blood was coursing with adrenaline. Every fiber of his being was focused now on the female: the sole survivor of his massacre.

He could feel her above him, her darkness rippling like the surface of water. At one moment it was exceptionally strong, filling his whole body with the sense of immortality, power, and greed...the descent into darkness. He looked up to the ceiling and scanned the shadows for whoever had started to laugh again.  
  
"Killian and Franc were weak," the voice said in fluent Romanian. Gabriel tried to find the source but the voice echoed through every crevice and crack in the ceiling making it impossible to find where the creature was. "They were no match for you. I see you've kept up with your training, Gabriel."

_Why do my enemies always know me better than I do?_ Gabriel didn't take time to ponder the thought. He didn't have time to. The final creature swooped down from the ceiling and grabbed his shoulders. Gabriel fired a few arrows into the beast as he was whipped around to face her. He continued firing, even when she bit down hard on his throat.

Carl threw a stake through the air, aiming it as best he could. The beast screamed and flew off with another laugh, taking a large mouthful of Gabriel's flesh with her. He ignored the pain and swung the crossbow to his shoulder, firing a large amount of arrows at the creature.

The woman laughed. She landed on the ground, absorbing all the arrows in her body by standing completely still. The arrows would not strike her heart. Gabriel heard the hollow click of an empty barrel. He reached for his gun again just as the vampire shook her finger at him, clicking her tongue between her teeth.

"No need for that Gabriel," she said. Her long white claw shortened into a delicate finger. Every inch of her leathery flesh became human skin once again. Her large white wings shrunk into her back and disappeared as her naked body was clothed in crimson.

Gabriel could not describe her beauty. It was like trying to describe heaven. She was pale and her skin was flawlessly smooth, like marble. She had long, sleek black hair that hung down on both sides of her face, framing her cherub features. She licked her blood red lips, still bearing small dribbles of Gabriel's blood. "You wouldn't want to waste those bullets on something that cannot be killed."

"Go to hell," he said and took up the stake Carl had given him. He charged forward a little and threw it at her. The vampire grabbed it out of the air. Gabriel stopped and grabbed his throat. He could feel something cold spread out into his veins and through his face. She laughed and took a few steps closer to him.

Carl got up with another handful of grenades. She held out her hand towards him. An invisible force threw him into the back wall, knocking him senseless.

"CARL!" He shouted. His voice cracked. The wound on his throat hurt like hell. He could barely breathe.

She laughed coldly again, smirking at him. "You really shouldn't surround yourself with people like that," she began, moving through the corpses comfortably. She was hardly a stranger to death. She had seen many die and most of the time she was the cause of their deaths. "They always prove their worthlessness at the most inconvenient moments."

She grabbed his chin harshly with one hand. Her nails dug into flesh leaving long lines of red, burning flesh in their wake. He tried to move, to punch her away or kick her in the chest, but every time the thought of injuring her came into his head he was left gasping for breath. The neck wound had started to burn.

"That wound is filled with venom," she began with a cold smirk. "In twenty-four hours you will begin to transform into my thrall, not unlike those worthless subordinates you just killed." She ran a finger down his chest. "And when you embrace your darkness I will take you as my mate."

"In your dreams," he said, gritting his teeth against the pain before kicking her across the room. He snatched up a silver stake off the ground, triggering the mechanism that slid the sharpened tip out and ready to use. Without another word he charged the woman and sent the stake sailing into her heart.

She choked. There was a moment where he thought it had worked. The silver stake was embedded in her breast, moving straight through her heart. Gabriel stopped, grabbing hold of his neck again. Blood dripped down into the spaces between his clavicle and shoulder bones before seeping through his shirt and down his chest.

The woman laughed.

"You don't remember me, do you Gabriel?" She said with a laugh. Her hand reached to the handle of the stake and ripped it from her chest. "You can't kill me with just silver Gabriel."

He groaned and turned back to find another weapon. The woman caught up to him quickly. There was a rush of wind before she had grabbed him again, holding his shoulder tightly in her hands.

"My name is Elizabeth Bathory," she said with a hiss. She leaned close to his ear and whispered, "Never forget it again."

She kicked off his chest.

"Twenty-four hours Gabriel!" She called to him as she flew away. Her body transformed into her vampire form. She broke through the ceiling of the headquarters and disappeared into the night.

* * *

Author's Notes: YAY! It's the second chapter and I'm seeing familiar reviewers. Thank you once again to Grissom who worked on this chapter and to everyone who left feedback! By the way, the flamethrower idea from Chapter 1 was J's idea. Sorry I left it uncredited and I used it without asking. I loved the idea though. Thank you!

'Something Wicked This Way Comes" is a Ray Bradbury novel, one that everyone should read. Ray Bradbury is awesome.

Reviews:

**_Lady Nessa_**: I'm so happy you're enjoying it! I hope you continue enjoying it!

**_HyperCaz_**: I am feeling extreme envy at your semi-friend. I would love it if my mom knew Hugh Jackman! Of course, I think my mom would enjoy that too (thinks about that a little). Hmmm...is it cool to like the same guys as your parents?

I'm glad to hear that you're not creepy enough to stalk him. I'll watch for you on Entertainment tonight just in case you ever become that creepy. Just so you know: I'll probably be one step behind you in the stalking department.

But that's too much information. Talk to you later!

**_Vampire Princess, Morwinda_**: I think Carl does have eyebrows. I hope he does. One of my friends got one of her eyebrows shaved off at a party and it wasn't pretty. Not only that, she held me responsible (even though I wasn't even at the party evil glare) Okay, I'm done. I said it because I could see Carl enjoying not having any facial hair so it wouldn't get burned off whenever he started a fire (a popular occurrence, Lol).

It's very fun to explain Gabriel's past. Everyone has such different views on it. Some people separate his character entirely from Bram Stoker's Van Helsing while others love the connection between the original hunter and Gabriel.

I hope this update was fast enough!

**_Grissom_**: No problem about getting back to me. Whenever you can get around to editing and e-mailing me is great. You probably have more of a life than I do anyways (still unemployed...GAH!) Anyways, thanks for all the work and confidence you have in my writing. I just got your story and I'm starting on it right after I get off the computer, and with my little sister nagging me, that will be pretty soon.

Don't be dawdling in the computer lab! Talk to you later!

**_Scholar_**: First advancement in the characters: Gabriel as Elizabeth Bathory's mate. Don't try and think about the mechanics of that. They're boggling my mind too.

**_Darkchylde_**: Thank you very much for the comment about the Mary-Sue. I was really worried when I added Mina that everyone would immediately point, shout, "MARY-SUE!" before chasing me with pitchforks and torches threatening to hurt me. It happens too often on this site and I was worried it might happen to me.

Thanks for looking back so often! I was worried I wouldn't post fast enough and then everyone would lose interest and then I would lose interest...but I love hearing that people are enjoying the story that much. THANK YOU!

I added a little more Carl and Van Helsing at the beginning of the chapter. It isn't much but I'll try harder for some more conversations between them. Thanks for the suggestion. Plus, I added the whole, "Carl-finds-out-about-Mina-and-Gabriel" thing. I could just imagine what Carl would do if he found them kissing (Lol). God I love Carl.

**_Saerry Snape_**: Glad you're enjoying it! (Does the happy dance)

**_Emeraldjewel_**: It's not the nicest feeling in the world when bad reviews start appearing on good stories. Just after I read Harry Potter I logged onto a Christian website and found all these bad reviews talking about how J.K. Rowling is the Anti-Christ. And while that happens, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen are still allowed to sell their "Two-of-a-Kind" drivel shudders. Even on this site I know some authors who write some of the best stories and find themselves with bad reviews.

I've only been attacked once, way back in the beginning with a Lord of the Rings story. Yes, it was a blatant Mary-Sue, but it still hurts. Thank you!

**_Fanfiction Fanatic_**: Smiles Thank you very much! I hope you've gotten a lot better since July. Hope to see you back again!

**_DoodilyDoo_**: I totally agree. Carl does have the best lines! Such favourites like:

"Why does it smell like wet dog in here?"

"Well actually I'm a friar."

"You killed him didn't you? That's why they get so annoyed!"

"I'm not going to like this am I?"  
Elizabeth Bathory: cruel, violent, sadistic...It's like Dracula under a microscope with a sex change.

**_J_**: I'm sorry I didn't put that it was your idea! I was so intrigued by the notion that I just had to use it. By the end of the story he'll have it finished...I hope.

I checked out the site and saw what I think is the DVD cover. The actual cover looks...bright to me, but the cover with the stake looks really cool. I smiled at the look, although I did like the green better. Oh well, as long as it's in my DVD player the day it comes out, I'm happy.

**_Trinity_**: What type of camp did you go to? I'm glad that it was fun to read the story.

_**Thanks to all reviewers, new and old. I hope you enjoyed this chapter and I'll be sure to get working on the next one ASAP!**_


	3. Things Can't Get Any Worse

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts pertaining to the movie Van Helsing are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur writing effort. There was no money made off the writing of this story.

* * *

Chapter 3: Things Can't Get Any Worse

"Carl!" Gabriel said as he shook his friend into consciousness. Carl seemed lost in a dream, mumbling incoherent nonsense about a woman named Monique followed by a list of reasons she was the greatest thing that had ever happened to him. Gabriel rolled his eyes and shook Carl a little harder. "Carl! Wake up!"

"Van Helsing? What are you doing here?" Gabriel allowed Carl's surroundings to say it for him. Carl rubbed the back of his head where it had hit the wall and he sat up, immediately faced with the harsh reality of their current situation. "I had hoped it was a dream."

"It never is," Gabriel replied, helping Carl to his feet. Carl dusted himself off and tried not to breathe through his nose. He was afraid to be met with the harsh scent of decay, even though the bodies were still only minutes into their death.

"Start looking for survivors, Carl," Gabriel said, wading through the sea of bodies with a keen eye. He looked at their features, past the blood from their ripped throats and torn bodies. He rubbed his throat, feeling the wound festering under his scarf. Carl hadn't noticed, and he wanted to keep it that way.

"How could a vampire enter the Vatican unharmed?" He asked to no one in particular. Mostly he was asking himself, searching through his thoughts to find something that made sense. The vampire Elizabeth Bathory had come to the Vatican on a mission of...what? Revenge? Hunger? Whatever it was, it didn't make any sense to him. "And for that matter..." He began, eyes narrowing. He picked up a metal crucifix off the ground. It looked as if someone had taken it by both ends and folded it in half, almost into a knot. "How are they able to touch crosses?"

"Van Helsing?" Carl called, grabbing hold of a heavy, overturned table. Gabriel looked up. "I've found Jinette!"  
  
Gabriel was wary of the bodies as he crossed over to Carl. He grabbed hold of the corner of the mahogany table that lay over most of Jinette's body and lifted. His jaw tightened and neck muscles flexed. He let out a groan of pain as he lifted, trying to ignore the blood moving down his chest. The pain gave him fuel. Adrenaline coursed through every vein in his body until at last the table was upright again.

Jinette coughed. He lay unnaturally still on the ground and only the cracking of his knuckles and the ragged breaths were signs that he was alive. Gabriel knelt down at his side as Jinette's eyes opened. The Cardinal attempted to sit up, but was restrained by the hunter.

"Easy Cardinal," he said, holding him back. He could hear more bones snapping in the Cardinal's chest. Gabriel's eyes narrowed as the Cardinal inhaled sharply. He watched in awe as Jinette's chest filled out again, his broken ribs mending themselves. Carl stared at it, stunned and silent.

Jinette coughed. "I'm fine, Gabriel. What hit me?" Gabriel didn't have time to respond. Jinette had started to survey the damage around him once his eyes had cleared, and he too fell silent.

"Dear God..." Jinette said, looking around. Gabriel was still scanning Jinette, moving his eyes in such a manor that he could see everything that had happened to the Cardinal. Sure enough, he found a bite mark on Jinette's throat, one that was slowly closing and healing just as quickly as the bones had. The Cardinal didn't notice it at all.

Self-consciously, Gabriel touched his own throat. The gaping hole Elizabeth had left there was carefully concealed by his scarf, but it was no longer bleeding. The wound was now healed, but a large mass of scar tissue was in its place. He was sure the blue veins were still spawning from it like a decrepit firework on his neck. Carl hadn't noticed though, and that meant that the 'decrepit firework' hadn't spread into his face yet.

Someone groaned from their position on the floor. The priests and monks throughout the headquarters had started to wake up.

* * *

"How did a vampire enter here?" Jinette demanded as he walked through the headquarters. Gabriel followed alongside Carl, heaving a large pile of books in his arms. Carl plucked a book off the top and flipped through it, studying the texts quickly. 

"Three vampires," Gabriel corrected. Carl shook his head and shoved the book back into the pile while yanking another from the middle of the stack. The other volumes nearly went tumbling to the floor. "Two thralls and their mistress."

"A Countess Elizabeth Bathory," Carl said, putting another book into the stack before extracting another. "Unfortunately the Vatican has few records on her but what I have been able to dig up is that she was a Countess of Transylvania and a rather cruel one at that."

"Sounds familiar," Gabriel said, making the connection between their newest threat and an older one, namely Count Dracula.

"I was under the impression that the Countess Elizabeth died in the early seventeenth century?" Jinette stated, looking over his shoulder a little as they descended down the stone steps into the chaos below. The priests and monks were already starting to clean up. Gabriel looked around. They all acted as if nothing had happened, just like Jinette had.

"Nothing ever dies in this line of work," Carl mumbled. His words were overlooked by the Cardinal who was glancing at Gabriel. Carl finished his statement anyways. "It was said that she consorted with witches and Satanists of all kinds during her reign."

"Pleasant woman," Gabriel said, looking back to Carl who had finally found a picture of her in one of the books. The face that stared back at him was rough and hardly detailed, but the features were unmistakable. It was definitely the vampire who had been there earlier. Gabriel was sure his memory wasn't playing tricks on him. He rarely forgot creatures that bit out large chunks of his throat in battles.

The Countess was young in the picture, wearing a ridiculous dress that hardly flattered her looks. But her face was flawless and smooth and her hair was jet black, pulled up and out of her face in a bun. Her eyes were dark. Gabriel couldn't tell what colour they were, but they were dark.

"Countess Bathory prided herself on her flawless complexion and determined – through one method or another – that the blood of young virgins applied to her skin would keep her young and beautiful forever," Carl snapped the book closed and placed it back on the pile Gabriel had in his arms. "She was arrested for the murder of over six hundred virginal young girls."

"How charming," Gabriel said as Carl opened up the book again and showed him a picture of one of her torture devices. A black iron cage hung over a large bathtub. A shower head hung from the base of the suspended prison to allow the blood to drip down into the bath below. Gabriel's brows furrowed. "How do I kill her?" He shut the book and set it back on the pile, handing it to a priest who walked by. The priest cocked a brow but said nothing. Carl watched the books disappear as they walked further into the headquarters.

"Conventional methods won't work, Van Helsing, since she is an elder," Carl explained. Gabriel rolled his eyes.

"Mind telling me what an elder is?" He asked. Carl groaned a little, but complied without complaining about how Gabriel never read anything.

"The four Counts and Countesses that sired the entire vampire race," Carl began as they moved through the religious dignitaries that cleaned up the mess. Gabriel was multitasking. Part of him was listening to Carl's speech. The other part was watching everyone very carefully. "Vampires only started surfacing in the early wars in history, mainly soldiers who forged pacts with the devil in exchange for everlasting life and glory on the battlefield. What they didn't realize was that one of the terms set forth by Satan was the allergy to sunlight."

"So they died?" Gabriel jumped to conclusions.

"Most of them did, but there were two who survived. The original blood King and his wife..."

"The Blood Queen, the Queen of the Damned, I know this part of the story Carl," Gabriel said.

"Nobody ever let's me tell the story," Carl said with a childish whine, but he continued nonetheless. "Anyways, Count Dracula and Countess Bathory became vampires in life without sires, through the very same pact as the King and Queen of the Damned. This makes it very hard for them to be killed."

"Where did you read that?" Gabriel asked him.

"Min..." he said, catching himself before he finished the name. The Cardinal gave a sharp glance over his shoulder before turning around again, thinking Carl was just muttering to himself. Carl swallowed hard. "The Vatican...dug up...excavated...books..."

Gabriel nodded a little as Jinette opened the door to his office.

"The Pope will not take kindly to hearing about this mishap. On Holy ground no less!" He was more angry at himself more than anything, Gabriel knew that much. Jinette wasn't his favourite person, but Gabriel knew better than to think Jinette blamed anyone but himself in this situation. "This is your top priority Gabriel. No more sneaking off somewhere. You will return to Transylvania and you will kill Elizabeth Bathory."

All the hunter did was turn around, ready to walk away with Carl to retrieve several undamaged weapons and ride off. The Cardinal, however, saw this as a perfect moment to say, "And I will be expecting an explanation for your multiple disappearing acts when you return."

_Perfect, just perfect, at least he's giving me time to think of a lie,_ he thought as he walked away without another word.

* * *

Van Helsing could not have been more furious as he marched through the Vatican. With everyone up and walking, it meant that naturally, they were just like him, infected with whatever venom Elizabeth had in her fangs. That would mean that just like him, in twenty-four hours, they would be the same thing: thralls, servant vampires the equivalent of Dracula's brides. 

"I don't like the look of this Van Helsing," Carl said, picking up the crossbow from the ground, handing it and two cartridges to the hunter. Gabriel took them from him. "I mean, just moments ago weren't all these men (he swallowed hard) dead?"

"It would appear that way, Carl," he replied, checking his pistols for bullets. He opened his mouth to ask for more just as Carl handed him several boxes filled with the items he was looking for. "Thank you, Carl. Whatever Elizabeth did to these men they don't remember a thing."

"Perhaps it was hypnosis. There are accounts through history of vampires placing their victims into a trance before drinking their blood," Carl was spilling facts just from his brain now. He looked around at the other priests with nervous eyes. They just shot him odd glances, wondering why he was staring at them the way he was. Carl looked away.

"I think there's something more than that," Van Helsing said, scanning around the headquarters suspiciously. He could only move his eyes because of the burning sensation in his throat. Gabriel itched at it, irritated with it; still trying to hide it from Carl's wandering eyes. "Why just attack the Vatican for blood? And for that matter, why attack the Vatican?"

"Because the Vatican stands in the way of the vampire population multiplying?"

"Or perhaps because it would be the best place to start multiplying the vampire population," Gabriel said. Carl's eyes narrowed in thought before widening in realization.

"Why of course!" He exclaimed, giving a little jump in happiness. It attracted some odd looks from the Vatican workers. Carl ignored them. "The Knights of the Holy Order was the society that sentenced Elizabeth to life imprisoned inside her tower in Castle Cachtice. Why is it that these monsters always have a grudge against humanity?"  
  
"That's what makes them monsters, Carl," Gabriel said, opening a door to the Vatican stables. Jinette had already contacted the guard it appeared, since he nodded them through immediately. Gabriel did nothing. He was still adjusting items in his coat. The guard to the stables bore the same scar tissue on his throat, but it was obvious that he thought nothing of it.

"Is there a problem Mr. Van Helsing?" he asked, concerned of the way the hunter was looking at him. Gabriel shook his head and continued on, following the sounds of the horses above him. He and Carl were silent until they had climbed the stone staircase into the dimly lit hallways of stalls for the horses.

"Carl," Gabriel said as he turned and looking down at his friend. Carl was listening intently. "I want you to stay here and keep an eye on the Vatican. No one goes into the headquarters and no one goes out, do you understand me?"  
  
"What the hell are you talking about?" Carl asked. He was a little surprised of his new mission assignment that Gabriel had given him. Van Helsing put a finger to his lips to quiet down Carl a little. Carl tossed his head about, rolling his eyes before whispering, "What the hell are you talking about?"  
  
"In twenty-four hours every single person down there is going to turn into one of her thralls," the hunter said, pointing down the stairs. "I want you to keep an eye on things from here. No one goes in and no one goes out. Are we clear, Carl?"

"How do you know that?" he asked. Gabriel sighed, saying nothing. He wanted to tell Carl. If there was one person he could trust in the world it was Carl. But he kept it to himself, not mentioning the throbbing wound on his throat.

"Carl?" he asked. "Are we clear?"

Carl was silent, wanting to know just how Gabriel got this information about the Vatican. He sighed and nodded. "And what are you going to do?"  
  
"I'm going to do all those horrid things you were talking about when we got here," he said, looking for his stallion. The jet black Andalusian horse whinnied in response to his rider's presence as if to ask him what took him so long to get back. Gabriel ran his hand between the horse's eyes, calming him before taking him from the stall and tacking him up.

"I don't like this plan of yours," Carl stated, crossing his arms.  
  
"That's comforting," Gabriel replied, mounting the horse.

"How is that comforting?"

"Carl, you have never once liked any of my plans. It's good to know nothing's changed."

Gabriel kicked the horse and rode out of the stables. Carl groaned.

"I hate it when he does this," he said and walked back down the stairs to the headquarters.

* * *

Elizabeth dropped the limp body of the beautiful young girl at her feet, staring at the dusty blonde hair that draped around the girl's head like a halo. She smiled softly at the sight of it and licked the blood from her lips, savouring every drop. The girl moaned a little, free from the trance Elizabeth's fangs had put her in. The countess turned to her three thralls, the salivating bunch of vampires in the corner. With a snap of her fingers they had attacked the girl viciously, biting her wherever their teeth were near. Within minutes, the corpse was nothing but small pieces of ripped flesh. 

"Dorotta," she said, summoning forth her dark haired partner. The woman curtseyed, never once making eye contact with the countess for fear of swift punishment. "Where's the hunter?"  
  
"He just left the Vatican, my lady, and will be heading towards the edge of the city any moment now," the woman said again, still not looking at her mistress. Elizabeth smiled coyly, looking back at the three male thralls behind her.

"Take these morons out for a while just to taunt him. I don't want him leaving the city until he absolutely has to," she said. Dorotta nodded and looked to the thralls, each feasting on small pieces of human flesh. Elizabeth spun and hissed, immediately transforming into her vampire form.

"GET OUT OF HERE!" she shouted. The thralls had transformed with small shrieks, their wings carrying them into the air. As Elizabeth turned she was human again, speaking to Dorotta. "Whatever you do, don't kill him."

"As you wish, my lady," Dorotta said, curtseying again before she too had transformed and flew out the window. Elizabeth watched the four vampires take to the skies.

* * *

Author's Notes: I am so sorry it took me this long to post such a short chapter. There was a lot of work I needed for school, I didn't send it off to Grissom for a while and haven't heard back yet, so I just decided to go ahead with posting it. The next chapter is in the works and will be posted much more quickly than this one was. Once again, sorry you had to wait! I like to post weekly. It was nearly impossible with my workload though, sorry! 

Reviews:

**_Grissom_**: I'm glad you know who Elizabeth Bathory is! I tried to get a little context into this chapter, but if you have the time to look up who she is, it's even better. Unlike Morgan, there are only a few accounts of Elizabeth and not much to draw different conclusions from. It makes it a lot easier!

Don't dawdle too much in the computer lab though. Computers are the way of the future (Here's an, "I TOLD YAH SO!" to the fool who said, "They'll never catch on.")

Bram Stoker definitely ran out of ideas. I saw that ending coming a mile away. And it's so hard to be climatic when he writes in journal format for the whole book. The most exciting part was the letters from Mina to Lucy and when Jonathan goes insane, and of course when Abraham Van Helsing was introduced. Other than that, the whole book is like swallowing a bottle of proverbial turpentine (no offence to anyone who really loves Dracula).

I saw the premier of CSI and was surprised! I thought Jorja Fox had been fired and spent the summer cursing the producers when I found out! It's good that she's back though.

I can't wait for the Van Helsing DVD! Long live special features!

**_HyperCaz_**: I wouldn't worry about the transformation. Vampires are a lot cleaner than werewolves. And I wouldn't dare turn Van Helsing into a fly eating Renfield from Dracula (although Hugh Jackman eating flies would be hilarious!).

It's a good thing that liking the same guys as your mom is still cool. Me and my mom like all the same guys pretty much. It's a little creepy, but everyone is creepy once in a while.

**_Trinity Van Helsing_**: Ouch, water balloons. My brother used to do that to me too. He used to get up on the roof of the house and pelt them at me and my friends. And then he got grounded, lol.

**_Emeraldjewel_**: Well in most religions all the good things in the world are classified as temptations, and we're not to fall into temptation. I am not a very religious person, but I do take a look at what other religions are saying about each other. JK Rowling being the Antichrist nearly made me send an e-mail with a long list of obscenities, but I wouldn't want someone doing that to me because I don't have much of a faith, so I avoided that.

Hugh Jackman would be cool as a vampire, even as a thrall. It was one of the reasons I made it happen to him, plus the race against time and the eventual battle...the ideas are just formulating. Of course Jinette is alive! You cannot kill a character like Jinette. The cool thing about Jinette is that he's not evil, and that even after Van Helsing kills all of those demons, vampires, and werewolves, he always has to go back to the Vatican and face Jinette, the only demon he can't destroy. Or maybe that analogy would work better for Van Helsing? I'm not sure.

**_Vampire Princess Morwinda_**: Smiles I am honoured by your words. Bows. I am happy that you are enjoying this story, even if my updates are really sporadic.

**_Scholar_**: No way Jinette could die! That man is immortal.

I agree! That line from Macbeth is absolutely amazing, very dark and creepy. Macbeth irritated me for a while, but in the end it was great! Read the Ray Bradbury novel though. It too is very dark and creepy, but so is a lot of Ray Bradbury's work. If you also read A Sound of Thunder, you're set for life. They want to make a movie and I am ashamed.

**_Fanfiction Fanatic_**: Life never goes the way you plan for it too. Sorry that you have to have surgery again. I've never had surgery, but I can't imagine that it's very pleasant. I hope everything is going well!

**_Lady Nessa_**: Whoa there! Calm yourself. I'm glad you enjoyed Carl and Van Helsing. They're quite a pair aren't they? Personally, I'm all for the dark, mysterious types, but you'd have to wonder how easy it would be to seduce him. He hasn't had the best luck with women.

Mina kicking Elizabeth's butt? I'm pretty sure Van Helsing will take care of it, but Mina will probably get a few hits on her for taking a bite out of her lover.

**_J_**: Training and license? (Begins hiding all those conspicuous items in basement that were NOT used to make a homemade flamethrower cough! cough!). I am such a pyro. In Chemistry class we blew bubbles with the natural gas used for Bunsen burners and lit them on fire. Our teacher nearly burned his eyebrows off. It was too much fun. Maybe Carl's flamethrower could have natural-gas-bubbles that explode?

Aerosol plus lighter is always good, especially with scaring your younger siblings.

Elizabeth definitely does not know as much as Dracula though, and not nearly as much as Morgan. She's the least informed of the trio. Michael, on the other hand...

I'm not saying anything else. Sorry if it's gotten a little predictable. I'll try and put as many twists as I can in it as possible.

**_Darkchylde_**: Van Helsing is a great healer. He's always been good at getting over things, of course that's mainly due to the unnatural blood that's been in his body. His dent can and will be fixed.

I completely forgot about the machine gun! Maybe he should carry that along to Transylvania this time, just to be certain. And vampire test dummies? Carl would get too much fun out of that. (Mina: OW! CARL! Carl: snickers evilly)

**_DoodilyDoo_**: Wow. I would love to send my stories into Universal, but they probably wouldn't accept them. Stephen Sommers is planning a sequel and a television series, and his sequel has the creature from the black lagoon. I think it will be a worthwhile sequel, as long as silly characters like Anna's twin sister or another 'illusive female figure' (no offence to those who have written those types of stories) are added to the plot.

**_Gothicvamp8000_**: The blood countess has always fascinated me. Her and Jack the Ripper. Maybe it's the unnatural amount of bloodshed associated with the stories. I'm glad you're enjoying it! I hope I'm doing her justice.

**_xImmortalx_**: Nice to see you again! I hope you keep enjoying it!


	4. Elizabeth's Wrath

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts pertaining to the movie Van Helsing used in this story are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur effort and no ingringement on copyright laws was intended.

* * *

Chapter 4: Elizabeth's Wrath

Gabriel wondered why he wasn't used to unnatural silences. They always seemed to surround him whenever something was going to happen. The whistling breeze would quiet to nothing but the rustling of papers as it brushed by the allies. The streets would be deserted and empty. He would find himself encircled by large, shadowed houses, ones that stared at him with vacant windows that pierced his soul like Dracula's eyes. He could see the flickering of candles just as they were blown out through the panes of glass, watching as darkness enveloped the room just as it was starting to do to him.

The horse was carrying him quickly away from the Vatican, past the large stone and marble homes with vine and ivy growing along their sides, down the city streets into the heart of Rome where he would navigate his way to the North East. His plan at the present was just get to Transylvania and to Cachtice, where he assumed Elizabeth would be heading, kill her and break the curse on the Order and himself. The vague details were little comfort to him since his mind was frantically asking him a plethora of other questions regarding his ambiguous set up. _She probably hasn't left the city. She's probably watching you, toying with you, and teasing with you before she _(he took a deep breath and turned down a nearby alley to avoid the streetlamps) _mates with you._

_That's NOT going to happen_, he thought to himself, slowing the horse to a brisk walk while he checked around the buildings. The alleys were crawling with rats, nothing more. Nobody was out walking or riding at this time of night. He quoted Carl when he thought, "N_o one is silly enough to go riding and walking at this time of the night...except maybe you, Van Helsing."_

There was a cackle. Gabriel pulled to a halt and whipped out his pistol, turning to face the full moon in the sky with his outstretched arm and weapon. The silhouettes passed over the moon, blocking the light for a moment, before soaring off in circles around him. He started firing just as the last one flew by. They were moving so fast they were large black blurs in the night.

It fell silent again. The four vampires who had been following him were perched on the rooftops, looming down over him from both sides of the streets. The female stood up, assuming her humanoid form. Her inhumanly pale skin was lit by the moon and gleamed with inexplicable brilliance that burned his eyes. She stood up, unafraid of his drawn weapon and looked at her subordinates.  
"The great and wondrous Van Helsing," she began, clicking her tongue between her teeth. Her accent was elegant and Romanian, just as her mistress's was. It wasn't Elizabeth. The vampire's hair was a bright red, straight and sleek as it framed her angelic face. Her eyes were blood red, the same as all vampires. "I would have thought you would have been difficult to find, but your horse makes so much noise."

"Sorry to have disappointed you," he replied. One of the male vampires jumped down from the roof behind him. In one swift moment, Van Helsing had grabbed hold of his crossbow and fired, striking him square in the heart, pinning him against the wall. The vampire twitched and convulsed before turning into dust.

The female vampire hissed again, this time louder. "There is a crime amongst vampires: If you kill your own kind you too are killed."

One of the subordinates laughed maniacally. Gabriel took aim at the female who grinned coldly. "I'm not you're kind." With that, he fired the crossbow.

She leapt into the air, spinning around as her form changed again. Her white and crimson gown became her thin white wings and small body. She whipped around, hissing at him, holding several of the arrows in her hand.

"Get him!"  
  
There were two other male vampires, one that had been hovering next to the female, the other who swooped down behind Gabriel. He fired twice at the one in front of him, turning just in time as the horse reared and threw him to the ground.

"Ow..." he said, his neck flaring to life in pain. He looked up in the sky at the three vampires who were now after him. "Just perfect..."

He rolled over and got up to his feet again, pulling the trigger on the crossbow as soon as he could see once more. The three vampires were thrown back against the pavement, their bodies filled with small arrows. Gabriel was too smart to assume they were dead. He raced forward and continued his barrage of arrows into their bodies.

The female was up and on her feet before the first arrow hit. She snatched it right out of the air, holding it tightly in her claws. Van Helsing's finger stayed tightened on the trigger, sending arrows into the smaller thralls. They were struck in the heart. The female was not. Like her mistress, the arrows simply would not strike her.

"Such a clever hunter," she said, throwing the arrow over her shoulder. Gabriel tried the trigger again. The weapon was empty.

He threw it to the ground, reaching for his pistol. The vampire hissed, lunging at him. She took a bullet to the chest, enough to knock a normal person back at least three feet, but kept coming, grabbing him by the arms and digging the claws on her toes into his chest. Gabriel cried out in pain, groaning loudly as she threw his gun to the ground. With her long tongue she licked his cheek, moving down to the neck wound where her mistress had left her scent. With every ounce of strength, Gabriel struggled to knock her away, before she could bite him. He knew she would do it. He could feel his skin prickle at the feeling of her fangs hovering over it.

"I wouldn't dare," she whispered. "Her mistress would have my head for touching her mate. She wants you...unscathed for when she claims you as her own."

"She won't be doing anything like that," Gabriel replied. The female pointed her feet, digging her claws deeper into his stomach. He grunted again. The force of her legs was knocking the wind out of him. She licked his cheek longingly, moving up from his defined jaw line to his temple slowly.

Somewhere off to his right he heard the tightening of a bowstring. The female vampire looked up, her blood red eyes in a frenzy suddenly as she looked off in the darkened alley. Without another word, she kicked off Van Helsing and flew off into the night, leaving nothing but floating ash in her wake.

Turning, Gabriel caught the glimpse of a bow loosening, the arrow sliding back into the quiver as the woman walked away, disappearing into the darkness. She glanced back over her shoulder once, her olive skin catching the light majestically before looking back in the direction she was walking in.

Gabriel's mouth opened. He knew that woman.

* * *

Dorotta watched him from above, unable to do much else. She had seen the woman, the fury in her green eyes, the swiftness of her bow...she had seen it many times, despite their differences in origin. She scowled at the sight and shook in fury. This meant telling Elizabeth they had problems, and that was something her mistress would not take kindly too.

She watched as the hunter picked up the crossbow, checking his coat for an extra clip before loading it once again. He shot a look in her direction. He was being cautious because he could still sense her, a darkness as old as her mistress, though not as potent as the Countess's evil. The blood Countess was evil incarnate, aside from Dracula, one of the four elders that watched over the realm of the vampires. Dorotta was pleased and eager to serve such a cruel mistress.

She lowered herself on the rooftop, flattening her wings against her back. Her blood red irises scanned over the hunter as he gripped his throat. Elizabeth's poison was taking hold of him, gripping his senses. The first twenty-four hours were hell, but only seconds later he would be a thrall, her mistress's creature and nothing more.

But the woman's appearance was now a thorn in her side, and despite the woman's oath to never interfere, Dorotta was worried that she might destroy her mistress's work, something she could not allow happen.

The hunter was already back on his horse, cursing it for being a scaredy-cat before riding off into the residential district of Rome. Dorotta stayed within close range, wanting to catch him off guard and without protection.

* * *

Gabriel searched the streets, up and down in all directions. There was a lingering feeling of evil somewhere, a darkness that seemed to follow him around the city relentlessly. He was unsure of whether it was the darkness growing within or the female vampire he had failed to kill earlier. All he knew was that he needed to see Mina for a moment, but he would not put her in harm's way if he could prevent it.

He knocked on the door, still searching the streets for anyone or anything. When Mina did finally reach the door he put a finger to his lips and pushed inside, shutting and locking the door behind him.

"Gabriel? What are you doing here at this hour?" Mina was wiping the remnants of sleep from her eyes, clutching an open book to the chest of her night dress. He started checking the windows and found that they were closed and bolted, just as he had hoped they were. Mina stared at him as he searched the rest of her house.

"What on earth are you doing?" She demanded. He left the bedroom after turning off the lamp inside. The only light they had was from the fire she had started in the living room fireplace. It was dim enough that she wouldn't be able to make out the wound on his neck. "What is it Gabriel, what's wrong?"  
"What do you know about Elizabeth Bathory?" he asked her. "Carl said you had some books on the subject."

"Well, yes," Mina said, crossing the room to the bookshelves on either side of her fireplace. She started moving her fingers over the embossed titles to read what they were. "She's a vampire elder, the youngest by standards of Dracula and the King and Queen of the Damned."

"Skip that part. How do I kill her?" he asked quickly. The words made his neck burn. Mina didn't notice as she scanned over her book titles.

The world was dancing in front of Gabriel's eyes. He found everything was growing hazy and his eyes were watering so much that every object in the room was beginning to have a cloudy glow to it. Mina whipped around, flipping through the pages of the book to find what she was looking for. Gabriel tried to pull himself together.

"Nothing," she said, slamming the book shut and grabbing another, "Nothing about how to kill her at all."

_For some reason, this doesn't surprise me, _he thought to himself, putting his hands on his hips. His mind strayed back to Dracula. He had to become a werewolf to kill Dracula. He had to sacrifice everything: his humanity, his soul, Anna...everything to kill Dracula. What made Elizabeth any different?

Mina tossed another book down and into the chair. She was about to grab another off the shelf when...

THUD! The sound of something heavy striking the floor made her jump back and Gabriel to cock his pistol. He heard the sound of screams from the woman above before she was silenced and there was another thud.

Gabriel dragged Mina into the centre of the room, holding her wrist as he turned about, checking over the entire house from wall to wall. The windows were the most likely point of entry. The vampire would probably soar in through the windows and tackle them to the ground before biting Mina over and over...

_No, stop thinking about that..._his mind drifted back to the present as he listened carefully, only able to hear the sounds of Mina's shaky breathing and his own heart beating, the constant lub-dub that never sped up, never slowed down, never did anything but beat continuously, over and over.

"What is that?" she demanded. Gabriel hesitated.

"A vampire," he replied. "One of Elizabeth's servants."

He pulled Mina closer to him, keeping the gun trained on the windows and door. The darkness was growing thick around the home. Even Mina could smell it. She groaned audibly. _He attracts too many wicked subordinates to my house. First faeries and now this..._

"Stay close," he said, pulling her behind him in an attempt to defend her. Mina looked over his shoulder as the footsteps above them moved to the far side of the room. Gabriel moved the gun around cautiously, just waiting for anything to happen. He was ready for it, whatever it was.

He ignored Mina's breathing and his own heart beating. Every fiber of his being was focused on the footsteps moving above them.

The footsteps were moving back into the center of the room until they came to a stop just above the hunter and the vampire. Mina stopped breathing entirely. Gabriel kept the pistol trained of the area where the vampire was standing.

Moments felt like hours. The vampire finally walked towards that stairs and the footsteps disappeared.

Gabriel heard Mina sigh and her body relaxed. He kept the pistol aimed at the ceiling for a moment more before lowering it. "What's going on, Gabriel?" Mina asked him.

The hunter didn't have time to respond. There was a loud crash as the ceiling broke and Dorotta dropped to the floor.

* * *

Author's Notes: In celebration of the release of Van Helsing, I have posted my new chapter. May I say that Stephen Sommers has outdone himself with the special features. The outtakes were an especially nice touch. And may I also say that anyone who owns the special edition is incredibly lucky. I got the regular version as a birthday gift. Oh well, I'm glad my family remembered. Not that I let them forget or anything...

May everyone have a Van Helsing filled day! I now dub October Nineteenth Van Helsing Day! Where everyone must watch the Van Helsing movie and only think about Hugh Jackman and how much they wanted a plane to fly out of Anna's cloud face at the end of the movie (in my opinion anyways).

Reviews:

**_J_**: There are so many things Carl should not have access to. Greek fire, large automatic weapons, gas powered crossbows, nitroglycerin...it's like giving a chimpanzee a revolver. (Gets a weird mental image of a chimpanzee with a gun) Wow, strangely it's still cute, although very morbid.

Azreal would be a cool addition to the story. I looked up his name on the website and in some books at the library and he would be a cool character to have pop up somewhere along the line. Who was the author of the story? I wouldn't want to plagiarize.

Cowboy Bebop is awesome! I love Ed, and Faye, and Spike, and Jet...and wow that basically the whole cast, besides Ein of course who's awesome too. I have the movie and watched it about six or seven times in one weekend. By Monday my friends were about ready to kill me.

**_Emeraldjewel_**: Read the book Queen of the Damned, but be sure to check out the rest of the Vampire Chronicles along with it. I would not recommend the movie at all. Stuart Townsend was a terrible Lestat, for no living person on the planet can play that character perfectly (say for Tom Cruise who did an excellent job in Interview with the Vampire). Aaliyah was annoying at best and the storyline missed out so many plot points from the book because the movie was a merger between The Vampire Lestat and Queen of the Damned books. Ah well, whatever floats your boat. Anne Rice is phenomenal though, especially if you love vampires.

I've never read Ramses though. Is it good?

**_Darkchylde_**: Interesting notion with the Queen of the Damned story. I'm not sure what I'm doing after this story, since the ending is still a mystery to me. Carl will probably go insane when the Vatican starts going batty (starts laughing) sorry, bad pun. There is a gag reel on the DVD! And I'm loving every second of Hugh Jackman's pretty face smiles giddily.

**_Doodilydoo_**: If Jinette had superpowers, he would so have laser beams shooting out of his eyes or the power to make things burst into flames. Van Helsing wouldn't be in a good mood after that. Hmmm...perhaps in the next story Jinette could become a pyrokinetic mutant!

Gabriel will tell Mina and Carl about the bite. Or they'll find out about it, he'll drug them and ride off in a fit of rage after Elizabeth Bathory. Or maybe I'm saying too much about the next chapters...

I'm pretty sure they're doing Van Helsing 2, because Universal just re-released the classic versions of The Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Invisible Man, and The Mummy. I'll take that as a good indication that Van Helsing 2 is a good possibility. But trying to choose between two Hugh Jackman movies is like trying to choose between cake and ice cream. Why not just have both?

**_Trinity Van Helsing_**: Posting online is really starting to get on my nerves too, especially with my original fiction. I've got writer's block with both unfortunately and can't finish them. This story too is becoming an inconvenience, especially with school.

Hope you post though!

**_Vampire Princess Morwinda_**: Oh my gosh! I am so sorry to hear about your stroke of bad luck, especially with you CD player and money. I can empathize totally. It sucks to be the target of other people's greed (gives her a cookie).

Have a good time in Ohio! I've never been.

HAPPY VAN HELSING DAY!

**_HyperCaz_**: We all came from frogs? That's a little awkward. I feel weirder than I did when I found out we may have come from monkeys. Of course I hated anthropology and barely paid attention in that class. Frogs would be cool though. Eating flies though? Shudders

**_Lady Nessa_**: It's always an interesting battle when Van Helsing starts the fight. Mina will have an awful lot of reason to kick Elizabeth's arse, and maybe Dorotta's, or maybe just Dorotta's...It'll be cool either way.

**_Fanfiction Fanatic_**: YAY! No surgery! Glad to hear everything's going to be okay!


	5. Alone, Naturally

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts in this story pertaining to Van Helsing are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur writing effort. No infringement on copyright laws was intended.

* * *

Chapter 5: Alone, Naturally

"Would you stop looking over my shoulder please, Friar Carl? You're making me nervous," Father Roderick was bent over the table, staring into the small magnifying scope as he scanned over a map. As the Order's finest navigator, Roderick was employed as the map maker, constructing maps that lead specifically to ancient castles and haunted caves where monsters lurked. Often times, his maps were kept in the archives so the Vatican could monitor previous mission sites. He lifted his head and looked at the small friar who was pacing anxiously back and forth in front of him. His blue eyes gleamed. "What seems to be the problem, friar?"

"Problem?" Carl asked in surprise. "No problem here father, none at all. No problems at all. Nothing you should be worried about. Nothing at all, no problems, no nothing. Why do you ask?"  
"Friar," Roderick began, standing up straight. He was a few inches taller than Carl at full height. "You've been pacing around my desk for nearly a half an hour. Your palms are sweaty, your brow is sweating, and you're babbling quite insensately whenever I ask you a question."

Carl stopped pacing. Every symptom Roderick had just named was accurate. His palms were shaking and sweating, his brow was dripping with perspiration, and he had just babbled about there being no problems. His physical reaction told everyone in the Vatican one thing: there was definitely a problem.

It was in Carl's favour that no one else but Roderick noticed.

"Oh, yes, well..." Carl said, wiping his hands on his robes. Roderick smiled and bent over his map once again, taking up his feather quill and dipped the sharpened tip in the ink well. With a skilled hand, he drew a small 'x' on the paper, right where Dracula's ice fortress would have been in the Carpathian Mountains. The second his eyes were off Carl, the friar was off and pacing again, just as nervously.

Carl's mind was moving at a hundred miles a minute. He was gifted with a brain that could move quickly, drifting from one thought to another with amazing speed but maintain a coherent thought process. Any stage of his thought could be accessed without having to spend agonizing moment backtracking through the trail of ideas. His mind started at the Vatican, the current state of the priests inside. Twenty-four hours later they would all start transforming into thralls.

_Thralls_, he thought to himself, _a type of slave or serf, one in bondage, intellectually and morally enslaved by a higher power._ _So Elizabeth has transformed every single member of the Vatican into one of her servants. _

_But how did Van Helsing know about it? _

"Friar Carl you're blocking my light when you stand there," Roderick said, lifting his head for a moment.

"Oh, sorry," Carl stepped out of the way, still lost in thought. He started back where he finished, taking no time to ask. _Now where was I?_

_Van Helsing knew about the venom_, he thought, pacing further from the light Roderick was using, _which meant that Elizabeth must have told him_.

But why would Elizabeth tell him something like that? Carl couldn't understand it. Gabriel had the ability to sense evil; that Carl did know. But never before had Gabriel ever been able to sense anything other than the darkness within a creature. The hunter would not have been able to 'sense' the venom that poured from her fangs.

Carl groaned. _Why the hell can't I figure this out? What am I missing?_

"Finished," Roderick announced, holding up the map. He smiled at his work, looking over the carefully sketched black lines of rivers and mountains to the red X's that marked off important places. Carl glanced from his handiwork and then back to the floor, mumbling about the excellent work the priest had done.

_Van Helsing knew about Elizabeth's venom. He couldn't have known it was venomous unless Elizabeth told him. The only reason Elizabeth would have told him would have been to taunt him. And the only way Elizabeth could have taunted Van Helsing is if...is if..._

Carl stopped short. He went rigid.

_Is if Van Helsing was infected too._

* * *

Van Helsing pushed Mina behind his back, putting his body in between her and Dorotta as a human shield. Dorotta wouldn't kill him. She'd throw him around a bit, probably scratch him up a little more, but she wouldn't kill him, not without the permission of her mistress.

Mina wasn't a part of their plans. She was collateral, like the two people upstairs.

"Such a pretty little girl the hunter is in love with," she said with a coy smirk. "My mistress would love to bathe in blood as rich as hers."

She hissed again, bearing her fangs menacingly. Gabriel's hand hovered over his holster, considering what weapon he could pull out of his coat of tricks next. His pistol was nearly empty and he had little time to reload. The tojo blades were almost useless against vampires. Hand-to-hand combat in general was hardly ever effective against vampires unless you could manage to be equally as quick as they were.

In Gabriel's experience, female vampires were usually quicker than the male ones. That did nothing to make his grim situation any better. He reached inside his coat and yanked out his pistol anyways, hoping to buy some time before the vampire attacked Mina.

Dorotta hissed again, but couldn't react fast enough before the bullet struck her in the right side of her ribcage. She was thrown back and lost her footing. Gabriel rushed forward with the tojo blades, slashing at her with every ounce of strength he had left.

"Get out of here!" He ordered Mina. With her lips pursed in a stern expression, she ran to the bedroom rather than the front door. Gabriel kicked Dorotta to the floor, slashing her from naval to throat before punching straight into her ribcage, shattering the bones as he reached her un-beating heart. It was not as suitable as a stake, but it was enough to delay Dorotta until Mina could get out of the house.

Dorotta was not so easily subdued, and even as he fumbled to grip the stone cold organ, she had already begun to transform once more. With a flap of her mighty wings, she threw Gabriel back to the ground. Once on her feet, her skin and bones healed and prepared to fight Van Helsing once again.

"You're so naïve," she said with a smirk. "Vampires are not so easily destroyed as that."

SNAP!

Dorotta's body was thrown back limply like a rag doll. Her head stuck the mantel on the fire place before she dropped to the ground with a shrill cry of pain. Gabriel sat up on the ground, watching as she writhed in pain, reaching blindly for the arrow that had impaled her chest. Her claws had just grabbed it when Mina drew another arrow. Another snap followed, and this time, it found its mark. The silver tipped arrow hit Dorotta in the chest, throwing her back on the floor with her head just inches from the fire.

Mina lowered her bow, her fingers still on the bowstring, prepared to fire again if necessary. Dorotta's body had already started to destroy itself, changing from flesh and bone to ash and dust in only seconds.

Gabriel got up and off the floor, dusting himself off a little as he did so. The arrow had seemed simple enough, just the design you would expect for a Saxon bow, but there was something different about it. No regular arrow, silver-tipped or not, could destroy a vampire. He lifted the arrow from the ground and examined it. The smell was unmistakable. The shaft was made of ash, a wood formerly used to make stakes for killing vampires. They had stopped production because silver stakes broke less often and were reusable. The ash wood deteriorated quickly, and did so within moments after Gabriel had picked it up.

"Carl has been doing custom work has he?" Mina released her bowstring, leaning the weapon against the wall. She gave a small nod, ever so slight, but the hunter noticed it anyways. "I thought you got rid of that thing?"

"I was considering it," she replied. "Who was that, Gabriel?" she asked, changing the subject back to the present rather than reminiscing further (pleasant as it would be).

"One of Elizabeth's servants," he replied, kicking the ash a little. "She attacked the Vatican."

"How?"

"I don't know. I was hoping you could tell me." Mina crossed over to the chair beside him, picking up her books once again. She flipped through the pages as Gabriel played with the arrow in his hands.

"She is an elder. That denotes a certain level of power every other vampire lacks." She flipped through the pages a little more and lowered herself into the chair, sighing deeply. Gabriel blinked hard, trying to hold his attention on her. His eyes were starting to blur again. The fire in his peripheral vision made his head hurt so badly he almost blacked out.

"Becoming an elder involves a ceremony called 'the Dark Embrace,'" She said, reading aloud the important points from her book. "It describes the passage of a soul through the Nine Gates of hell. The first stage is thrall, namely a servant to a higher level of vampire. The second is wraith, third is daemon, so on and so forth until you reach the elder or Incubus as it is referred to in vampire legends." She held up the book to him, showing him the picture of the Nine Gates and the names of the levels associated with them. Gabriel had to squint to read them clearly, and even then his eyesight was still dancing hazily as if he were on opium. He handed the book back. "Elizabeth actually started out as a thrall to her aunt. As a teenager she was introduced to all the glories and pleasures of the underworld, orgies and whatnot. And then she was married to the Blood Prince of Hungary, and then the real trouble started."

"Oh, just then?" he asked sarcastically. She gave a small smile, brief and flippant, nothing more. "Let me guess: she started making pacts with the devil, murdering countless innocents, and then somewhere along the line I knew her?"

Her eyes narrowed at the last comment, before she lifted an eyebrow in surprise. "You knew Elizabeth Bathory?"

"Mina, I have known every dark lord and lady I have ever faced in my entire career." He looked away from her. The eyebrow dropped.

"You are aware that Elizabeth Bathory lived over two hundred years ago?"  
"And Dracula was over four centuries ago. There isn't any difference." Gabriel groaned again as the pain in his neck flared up once more, spreading further up through his face, all the way to his temples. He grabbed hold of the mantel for balance.

"Are you alright?"  
He paused for a moment, gripping the mantel tightly as he opened his eyes again. The world had changed somehow, as if everything around him was brighter and bolder. The fire astounded him, its long waves of red and yellow flames and black smoke rising up to the chimney. The smell of the logs made him stare harder as if he had never seen fire before.

The sounds were louder. He could hear the clock across the room ticking as if it were just inches from his ear. Above him, blood dripped from the corpses left by Dorotta. Mina was breathing slowly, watching his every move. Even the swishing of her eyelashes as she blinked was heard as sharply as the rest of the room.  
"Gabriel?" she asked again, rising from the chair. Her voice failed to register itself in his mind. The swishing fabric of her night dress drowned out her words.

"Gabriel..." the haunting voice in the back of his mind reached his ears, finding it's way past the sounds of the clock and the blood, burrowing deep within his brain. "You can hear me, can't you? Of course you can. It's the first sign that you're losing grip."

"Gabriel..." Mina laid her hand on his shoulder. Gabriel jerked awake. He felt better than before, but his current physical and mental state could best be described as 'shit'.

"I'm fine," he replied. "I'm fine. I need to find Elizabeth..." he stepped away from her. Mina stared down at the fire before looking after him. He was slipping his tojo blades back in his sleeves, reloading his pistols and searching his many pockets for another cylinder of arrows for the crossbow. _Naturally,_ Mina thought bitterly, _a weapon first and then the lady. Typical._

"What are you going to do? Ride off to Cachtice, march inside, stake her and then walk back out again?" she demanded. There was a hint of anger in her voice, enough for him to pick up on it.

"I certainly can't stay here," he replied, putting another bullet into his pistol. "The Cardinal has already arranged for me to go."

"And so you go."

"Yes," he answered quickly, putting the gun back into his holster before turning to look at him. Mina's jaw was tightened. "Did you expect anything else?"

"I would have expected you to come up with something better than that," she replied, "Even with your history of vague details."

"What do you have in mind?" he asked her.

"Something to do with getting past an army of werewolves, hundreds of thralls, and then perhaps a plan of how you're expecting to kill an elder."

Gabriel gave a small shrug. "Thralls, wraiths, elders, they're all the same. They just get harder and harder to kill." Mina rolled her eyes, mumbling under her breath about how he just didn't get it. Gabriel either didn't hear her or he just ignored her, since he was already on his way to the door. Mina rushed over to her bedroom, picking up her bow on the way. She started ripping off her night clothing, grabbing a one of Jonathan's old trousers, shirts, and jackets from the wardrobe.

"What are you doing?" he asked her, stopping just by the door. Mina dressed and tied her hair in a knot on the back of her head.

"I'm going with you, what does it look like I'm doing?"  
"No you're not. You're staying right here."

"No." She answered quickly, taking up her bow and quiver once more, slinging them over her shoulders onto her back. "No I'm not. I'm tired of just staying here."

"Mina, you're not coming to Transylvania with me. It's safer for you to stay here." She didn't seem to care as she walked to the door, standing next to him with her head held high. Gabriel looked down at her, her eyes fierce and gleaming.

"I'm coming with you Gabriel, one way or another."

Mina was stronger than Gabriel had ever seen her before. It wasn't often that she jumped on the chance to go on a mission with him. Not that he would have minded. Any other time he would have loved her to come along. Carl hated being dragged to different countries and cities. He loathed the outdoors and everything to do with it. Mina enjoyed getting away once and a while, although hunting monsters was hardly her cup of tea unless she really had to.

"You cannot tell me what I will and will not do, Gabriel," she said, her voice stronger than he had ever remembered it. "I'm going with you. That's final."

"Mina?" He asked her quite calmly. Her eyes narrowed, suspicious of what he was about to do. Her arms were ready to stop him from detaining or forcing her back into the house. What he did was the one thing she wasn't expecting. He reached into his coat and yanked out the spray canister of tranquilizer. Mina twisted her head away but breathed in enough of the spray to send herself into a swoon. As she fell back, she inhaled once more and passed out. Gabriel caught her before she hit the floor.

"Sorry," he told her, knowing she probably couldn't hear him. He took the quiver and bow from her back, setting them aside before carrying her into the bedroom.

Van Helsing laid her on the bed, wrapping the jacket around her tightly so it acted as a blanket. He placed a gentle kiss on her forehead before walking out of the room.

* * *

Author's Notes: I have a job, J-O-B! Yes, that's right. Sorry, I've been unemployed since the summer and I'm going through employment deprive. And I'm making more than my friend without promotion! Sorry, I had to take that moment to be petty. She's been bragging about her 7.50 since she got a job, so now it's my turn!

Okay, I'm done now. Thanks very much to Grissom who had this chapter edited and ready to go as quick as she could. Everyone can owe the flawless spelling and grammar to her. Thank you so very much, Griss! Also, my first paragraph was also a sign that my updates might be sporadic again, just so you know. I haven't died or anything, my employer is just working me to death.

Hope everyone enjoyed the chapter. Oh, and just a question to make conversation with everyone, how do you think this story should end? I have a few possibilities, some that readers won't be impressed with and some they might have my head for thinking about, but I want to hear what developments you would like to see. Have a Happy Halloween, everyone, and don't eat your candy until it is checked by an adult! Oh, and always wear bright clothing so the cars can see you, and watch out for razor blades in caramel apples. And if you're not going trick-or-treating, a fun and exciting past time is eating a large amount of chocolate while watching the Van Helsing special features (Curses limited edition for being released AFTER I got the normal one). Happy Halloween!

Reviews:

**_DoodilyDoo_**: Glad to have made your Van Helsing day even better! And I hope this was fast enough. I would hate to be chased down by Brad Pitt. Have a complimentary Carl shaped chocolate bar and have an uber-spooky Halloween!

**_Saerry Snape_**: I believe I have left you with another cliffhanger (ducks down behind desk to avoid being hit by flying projectiles). Please don't hurt the cliffhangers! I might have to sick my army of plastic flamingos on you. Now here, have a Carl chocolate bar as a consolation gift.

**_J_**: So many terrifying inventions for Carl, so little time, what with being dragged to Transylvania and England (twice, mind you, if you've seen the London Assignment which you have since I recall you mentioning how hilarious the kiss with Victoria was). I will check out Ellen Brand, I would love to see her work.

Mystery lady with crossbow? I'll never tell... (in Brittany Murphey's voice from Don't Say a Word) until I write the chapter that reveals all, of course.

Oh, and you may have a Carl chocolate bar as well.

**_Trinity Van Helsing_**: The book Interview with the Vampire is absolutely excellent! Of course the movie left out a couple of things and ruined a few characters' appearances, but I can't see many parents lining up their five-year-olds to play the vicious Claudia. Kirsten Dunst was great anyways.

Happy Halloween (tosses her one of the previously mentioned chocolate bars)

**_Fanfiction Fanatic_**: I hope you've bought the movie by now. If not, I'll watch it twice tonight: once for you, once for me. Or maybe twice for me...I don't know. Van Helsing looks really good with his shirt off, and no matter how many times I will it to happen, a plane will not fly through Anna's face (growls). Alas, there are more important things to worry about, such as Van Helsing 2. WHERE IS STEPHEN SOMMERS WHEN WE NEED HIM FOR A SEQUEL!?

Oh, and here's a chocolate bar. Happy-Belated-Van Helsing Day!

**_HyperCaz_**: Van Helsing Returns seems like a very possible title, although I was hoping for something more original like...Van Helsing 2: The Something from Something or Other (insert big musical climax here). Silly Stephen Sommers and his predictable titles. Why can't anyone be like George Lucas anymore? I was so taken aback by the clones attacking in Star Wars Episode 2: The Attack of the Clones (please note the sarcasm).

I heard about the animated franchise. If they were going to do one, I would want it to be focused on the previous adventures of Van Helsing instead of Transylvania in general. Ah well, whatever makes you money right?

Oh! And here's your Carl-shaped-chocolate bar.

**_Emeraldjewel_**: (Smiles coyly) I will not reveal the true name of the mysterious woman-with-the-bow-and-arrow until the proper time. No hints will be given; although I can tell you that you may or may not be right (does something shady).

No worries about spoilers in your review! Here, have a chocolate bar.

**_Vampire Princess Morwinda_**: Thank you for the Happy Birthday! I finally watched the commentary with Will Kemp, Richard Roxbourgh, and Shuler Hensley and laughed my butt off all the way through. They were great together! I loved learning about all the wire stunts and the repeated mentioning of how cold it was in Prague while they were filming. Lol. It was good.

Nice to hear that your luck is changing! I'm glad you had a good time in Ohio and that you got a chance for revenge, with a tojo blade no less. Note to self: Must find tojo blades if it kills me.

I'm out of Carl chocolate bars, so you can have the Velkan one.

**_Lady Nessa_**: I'm sure a victory for the good guys can be arranged. It's always a nice way to end a story, although character death is good Just kidding! Awesome commentaries on the DVD, very informative. God, I want a sequel. Take a complimentary Velkan chocolate bar before you review.

**_Scholar_**: Hmm...no bone in this chapter, sorry. I suppose I'll have to up the meanness on Elizabeth Bathory, but that's a story for the next chapter. Mina will be back!

I wish I still had some Carl chocolate bars. Umm... (searches around messy computer desk) How about a Carl action figure with karate chop action?

**_Darkchylde_**: I loved the whole falling scene! It was made even funnier with Hugh Jackman saying he wouldn't trip, and then it seemed like he did nothing but tripping! The Marishka chase was excellent though, I agree. I still have to watch the "You are in the movie!" thing. I'll get to that later tonight.

I've heard of Anita Blake and wanted to get my hands on them, but I still have very long book lists and it's really irritating when I have plenty of other things to read. But vampire politics and magick sounds fun!

Lol. I'm sure plenty of Van Helsing fans would love to get their hands on either Anna or Stephen Sommers for the ending. She gave Mufasa a run for his money (The Lion King).

Farewell as you watch Stargate (Season 1 is the best, O'Neill is my hero, and the episode 'Solitudes' makes me cry). Have a wonderful Halloween, and take this chocolate Cardinal Jinette because he's funny, and he'll make an appearance in later chapters.

PS: What are dissertations?

**_ShadowHawk_**: I'm sorry. My e-mail is set to exclusive and any other addresses end up in my Junk Mail folder (I've signed up to so many sites they all send me really weird stuff). I'll write down your e-mail so if you try it again I'll get it.

Happy Halloween! Take this Cardinal Jinette chocolate bar.

**_xImmortalx_**: I'll try to keep him from becoming a thrall. You're right though, he just doesn't fit the role of a servant, especially to the psychotic Elizabeth Bathory. Hungarians are crazy people, no offence intended if anyone is Hungarian. My friend is, and even she agrees with me when I say that Hungarians were some of the most violent people on the planet.


	6. Still Fighting the Good Fight

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts in this story pertaining to the movie Van Helsing are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur writing effort and no money was made off the writing and or posting of this story.

Warning: The first two paragraphs of this chapter involve a child's corpse. I tried to be vague, but I would like to warn anyone who might be disgusted by that sort of thing.

* * *

Chapter 6: Still Fighting the Good Fight

Elizabeth Bathory held the young girl's throat. Thirteen years old and already the sweet Italian child was flawlessly beautiful. She had long chestnut curls and large green eyes, ones that spoke of a wisdom unnatural to such an age. It was not the unspoken intelligence the girl possessed that Elizabeth was taken with, however. She was much more concerned with the gorgeous features, the smooth skin and wonderful complexion.

She dropped the body to the ground. The angelic child lay on the floor of her bedroom as if asleep, staring soundlessly into the corners of the room with widened eyes. Elizabeth looked over at the large bed she had taken the child from, watching her younger brother sleep peacefully, dreaming of secrets. She walked away quickly, not hungry for a man's blood after the feast at the Vatican. Too much testosterone made her sick.

She approached the window slowly, but stopped short. Something was wrong. She could no longer hear the heavy breathing of her thralls. The emptiness of her world consumed her suddenly. Just minutes ago she could no longer feel Dorotta, but now her mindless servants were missing, something that made her feel very disconnected.

There was a sudden crack as the window shattered. The small boy sat upright in bed as the grappling hook shot right past Elizabeth and into the wall. Within seconds, Gabriel Van Helsing was at the window sill, and he had already thrown a silver stake into Elizabeth's breast.

"I thought we determined that this didn't work," she said, unamused, fumbling with the stake helplessly. Her hands moved over it too quickly to get a good grip on it. She sniffed it. Gabriel had covered the surface of the stake in lamp oil. She looked up just as he pulled the trigger of one of his pistols. The glass bullet struck her breastbone and ignited the oil.

Elizabeth transformed so quickly it was a blur. The boy in the bed had already made a run for the door, but with one flap of her wings, Elizabeth had him in her arms. She grabbed hold of his head and wrapped her arm around his body, pinning him to her chest.

"Do you want more innocent blood on your hands tonight Gabriel?" she demanded, her fangs just hovering over the boy's throat. The child was hyperventilating, his eyes staring at the dark figure that had entered his bedroom from the window.

Gabriel kept the pistol trained on her, aiming at her face. Her jaw tightened.

"I want you to release them."

"Never!" She hissed. "The Knights of the Holy Order deserve what they have been given! As do you!"

"Than I'm willing to make a trade," he said loudly. "I'll come willingly; just release them and the boy."

Elizabeth was quiet, her bright red eyes staring menacingly at Gabriel. The boy was whimpering softly under her hands as her teeth moved over his throat, leaving stinging pink flesh in their wake. Gabriel wasn't sure what she was doing, but she was probably considering his offer. She hadn't bitten the boy, but she hadn't released him either.

"You'll come willingly?" she clarified, still threateningly close to the child's throat.

There was a beat. Gabriel nodded softly. "Yes."

"And you'll descend into darkness freely?"

Another beat. He nodded again. "Yes."

She was seriously considering it now, silently deliberating the cost and reward of their deal. They were frozen together, at an impasse with one another. The hunter had his gun aimed at her face. She felt her skin crawl at the thought of something striking her precious skin besides blood.

"Drop your weapon," she commanded.

"Release the child," he answered, just as demanding as she. Elizabeth loosened her grip but kept the boy within her grasp.

"I said drop your weapon, Gabriel." She opened her mouth over the boy's neck, unfolding her wings until they nearly surrounded her and the boy in a cocoon. Gabriel took a deep breath, watching as she bit down slowly on the boy's throat and closed her wings.

Defeated, he threw the gun to the ground.

Elizabeth laughed, opening her wings again. A small amount of blood trickled down the boy's chest. Tears moved down his cheeks slowly. Gabriel watched him, the guilt consuming him in thick, impenetrable waves that slowly suffocated him. The vampire kept her arms around the child.

"Now," she said, "Prove your loyalty to me." She pushed the child towards him. "Kill him."

The boy started to sob.

"Kill him and I'll release the Vatican," she said, pushing the boy closer to him. Gabriel stared at the small boy, barely eight years old, standing just a few feet away from his dead sister. He looked from the child to the Countess. Elizabeth's eyes were narrowed in anger, waiting for him to do something other than just stand there. "Do it." She commanded again. "Kill the child, save the church. Allow the child to live, destroy all of human kind. This one boy, the boy of two peasants who will amount to nothing no matter what the fairy tales say, is the balance between of life itself. And all you have to do is drink from him."

There was nothing he could say. The boy was sobbing, screaming out for someone to help him. Elizabeth could hear footsteps coming up the stairs. She turned back to the door and with a sweeping motion of her hand, it slammed of its own accord, locking the parents out.

"Tick tock, Gabriel," she said quickly, transforming back into her human form. Blood still dripped from her face from her bath in the girl's blood. Gabriel took the boy by his shoulder. The child kicked and screamed as he was yanked forward to the hunter. Gabriel lowered, grabbing both the child's hands together and pulling his head to one side. There was frantic knocking on the door and Italian voices screaming for their son. But all Gabriel could hear was the throbbing of the boy's vein, the beating of his heart.

_"I can read the character of a man by the sound of his heart beat,"_ Dracula's voice echoed in his mind. Gabriel understood what the Count had meant as he stared longingly at the boy's throat. His throat felt dry and his stomach felt empty, as if he hadn't eaten in weeks. The heart beat was so rapid it sounded like a hum rather than a beating sound he was used to.

"Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock Gabriel. I'm losing patience. Just do it. Do it for me, Gabriel."

He felt his teeth sharpen, his eyes burning like flames as the blood colour swallowed them up, and suddenly he found his face moving closer and closer to the boy's neck.

Elizabeth was consumed with the sight as she wiped the blood off her face and into her mouth. She felt every pore fill with the beautiful liquid and suck it from her skin. She watched as her hungry thrall opened his mouth, his fangs just stubs in his mouth. They were hardly fit for adults, but the boy's soft skin they would pierce quite well.

In one swift movement, Gabriel pushed the boy behind his back and he grabbed his pistol out of his coat. Elizabeth screeched, jumping up and through the ceiling as a slew of Van Helsing's bullets flew to where she had once been standing. He ran to where she had taken flight and aimed upwards, looking off into the sky. There was nothing but stars above him, the blue moonlight cascading down on his face. Angrily, he turned and walked back to the window, picking up his pistol before turning back towards the child. The boy shrunk back to the bed from the sight of Van Helsing.

Gabriel never forgot the look in that boy's eyes. That shocked expression that he found only on the victims of vampires, the same expression his sister had, and the very same as Anna's face when she died.

_"Have you ever killed anyone?" Shadow asked him, pulling the thick cigarette from her large lips. Gabriel shook his head, pulling his coat tighter around him as the chill of the desert passed over him again. During the day he was too hot, especially when he was out of the sun. However, when night fell, he was shivering even with his coat on. Shadow seemed oblivious to this though, having lived in and around the desert her whole life._

_"Anyone or anything?" he replied, wanting her to clarify._

_"Anyone," she said, "anyone innocent."_

_The question caught him off guard. He looked away from her and into the fire they had built outside the caravan for dinner. Silently, he thought about the question, wondering if that was true._

_Shadow waited patiently, running her fingers through the sand. She took another drag on the cigarette and offered it to him. Gabriel shook his head._

_"Those things will kill you," he said. Shadows shrugged and took another puff, blowing smoke rings in the air. _

_"You're avoiding the question," she said. _

_Gabriel smiled softly, looking away from the fire to the blanket of stars that moved overhead. He shook his head finally._

_"No," he said. "I've never killed an innocent person."_

_Shadow sighed, blowing another cloud of smoke into the air. It moved upwards into the sky and vanished almost immediately, leaving behind the scent of burning herbs and leaves. She smiled softly._

_"I don't think it's possible," she said finally. "I think everyone's guilty of something. Even those who can't remember what they're guilty of."_

_Gabriel turned back to face her, but Shadow had already gotten up and walked away._

* * *


	7. The Storm Breaks

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts in this story pertaining to Van Helsing are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur writing effort.

* * *

Chapter 7: The Storm Breaks

Gabriel knew the city of San Marino well, considering he had only been there once or twice in the past he could remember.

He walked his horse down the docks to the boats waiting to carry him over the Adriatic Sea. He stopped a moment, lost within the bustling crowds of crewmen and families saying farewell as a memory struck him. It was distant, but so many of his memories were.

_"I have never been to the sea."_

_Anna paused staring off into the distance as if trying to imagine what the sea looked like. Gabriel had once tried to describe it to her on their way back to Vaseria. They were sitting awake, driving the coach as hard as it could go. His explanations didn't make it any easier. She just laughed when he insinuated that there really were places on earth where the only thing one could see was water for miles and miles. _

_"I'll bet it's beautiful..."_

_Beautiful..._Gabriel thought, looking around at the sea before him. His sea wasn't beautiful. It was dark and gloomy with black waters, only illuminated by the white moon light. Yes, this is what Anna was missing: the darkness and the loneliness, the weight of the world falling down on his shoulders as he stared out into the horizon.

"Heading our way?" he looked up and onto the deck. Janos Tamas tossed his thick canvas bag on the deck, brushing the oily locks of black hair from his face. Gabriel rolled his eyes.

"They haven't fired you yet?"

"Hah! You're funny, fedeles zsebóra," Janos said, saying something in his own language; the way it sounded made Gabriel wonder if Janos was saying it in Hungarian to avoid a violent reaction from his friend. "Off to Hungary? Romania?"

"Transylvania," Gabriel said. His friend smiled again.

"Back to Hell," he said. "You just keep going back there don't you?"   
"Every other week," Gabriel said. Janos took his horse's reigns from him and walked the animal up the gang plank with the hunter following close behind. "I would have imagined you finally going home rather than waiting around here."

Janos shrugged. "I have a few more months of work, and then I will return. Not that I have much to get back to."

"I know that feeling," Gabriel replied, looking around the deck cautiously. The crew was busily preparing to set sail for the other side of the sea. If his timing was right, he would be riding over the Carpathian Mountains when the curse took full hold of him. _Perfect..._

The wind whistled around them. Gabriel looked up to the sky, watching the horizon.

"Storm clouds on the rise," Janos pointed out. "You sure you want to set sail tonight?"

"Yes," the hunter replied quickly with a small groan. As the wound in his neck pained him again, Jinette's voice filled his head again.

_"For you this is all just a test of faith..."_

_God should find something better to do than test me._

He scowled at the approaching storm and followed Janos into the cabin below the ship.

* * *

"Where is this sample from?" Father Bradley asked, taking the two phials of blood from Carl. The small friar folded his arms and tried to calm his pounding heart.

"I can't tell you my sources. If I did I would have to kill you." The aging Father Bradley shot Carl a suspicious look, but did not press the subject further. He looked at the samples of blood Carl had asked him to analyze.

"I can tell you that one of these is thinner than the other," he said, shaking them a little. The second moved more like water while the other looked like oil. "There seems to be an anti-coagulant present in it. If you told me where you got it from I could give you a better explanation."

Carl swallowed, wiping the sweat from his brow. "They're both human samples." He pulled his robe over his hand to hide the cut he'd made. It was the only way to determine what was in the Order's system and he needed a healthy comparison. If Gabriel was right, his blood would be the only sample not infected. He took the other sample from an enthusiastic rookie in the Order, who was under the impression his blood was part of Carl's biggest experiment yet. _Not a total lie,_ Carl said, trying to clear his conscience.

The white haired priest placed several drops of Carl's blood onto a slide and examined it under his magnifying eye piece. "This one is the human sample. Everything is in working order. And as for the other..." He procured another slide from a box on the table and placed a few drops of the second sample. It nearly seeped over the sides of the slide. Bradley looked down at it, squinting a little. "It has an anti-coagulant in it, quite a strong one as well. And..." He stopped a moment, squinting harder. "Where did you get this sample Carl?"

"Why do you want to know?"

"Carl, this person has an anti-coagulant in it that I've never seen before." The old priest looked up and stared at Carl. "It's almost as if the anti-coagulant is replenishing all red blood cells and rejuvenating them. I've only seen this type of work happening in..."

"In vampires?" Carl asked frightfully.

Bradley was silent for a moment before he nodded. "In vampires..."

* * *

The Holy Order was eerily quiet, and Carl could scarcely breathe. He walked briskly to the Cardinal's office and, without knocking or shouting some kind of introduction, walked inside.

Jinette looked up in surprise, tossing the papers in front of him a little from the shock the friar had given him. Carl was hyperventilating now, getting hideous mental images of the Cardinal attacking him viciously, ripping out his esophagus and trachea and jugular vein and...

_STOP IT!_ He commanded.

"What is the meaning of this outburst Friar Carl?"

Carl's mouth went dry. He swallowed hard.

"Yes?" Jinette said, waiting for an explanation.

"What...what if I told you...we had a problem?"   
The Cardinal grinned whimsically. "I have not heard an explosion in over an hour friar, I would say for you that IS a problem."

"I would gladly return to my post and continue but I'm afraid it's far more serious than that."

"What seems to be the problem?"   
There was silence for a moment, Carl, attempting to calm himself enough. What issued forth from his mouth however was far from collected. He took a deep breath and because.

"Elizabeth Bathory has infected the entire Vatican with a poison that will turn them into her thralls in just a little under 23 hours – although this is a rough calculation, for I don't know when exactly you all were bitten, but that's beside the point – you will all turn into her thralls and Van Helsing has been bitten too."

Jinette blinked. "Can you repeat that Carl?"

Carl took a deep breath and slowed down a little.

"Elizabeth Bathory attacked the Vatican," he said, "And she killed everyone in here. Except no one stayed dead because she bit everyone and transferred a slow moving venom into their bloodstreams, one that will turn them into her thralls within 23 hours – although that is a rough calculation. And I think Van Helsing is infected too."

There was silence. The Cardinal couldn't say anything. He just stared at Carl for a moment, unable to speak. He finally managed to find the words.

"I need you to go find Van Helsing, Carl," he said quietly. "I will issue a lockdown of the entire Order until you return."   
"But I'm hardly a field man!" He said, inadvertently protesting. It wasn't that Carl was afraid (he was terrified, but everyone knew that). He just knew that finding Van Helsing on the hunt would be nearly impossible. Already an hour had passed. There was no telling how far Van Helsing gone in that much time. "He's not someone who is easy to find Cardinal..."

"You are the one who knows him best," Cardinal Jinette said. "Bring him back here. We will deal with Elizabeth Bathory later. Right now, you must find him and make sure he cannot transform. The damage he causes as a human is already catastrophic. If he is allowed to become her thrall, the damage could be irreparable." There was a short pause as the Cardinal breathed, remaining quite calm. "Find him Carl. Use every one of the Vatican resources at your disposal."

"And if I can't find him before the time runs out?" Carl asked, but he already knew the Cardinal's answer. Jinette didn't say anything. He nodded and looked down at his desk.

"Pray friar that it does not happen."

* * *

_He felt someone kissing him. Mina? No, not Mina. Mina didn't smell like blood. She smelled of perfume and soap, of flowers and fire. This woman was drenched in the scent of death, not necessarily of decay, but most definitely of blood. He opened his eyes and saw her pull back, a layer of her black hair falling around her beautiful pale face. Her lips had blood on them, and as his lips stung, he didn't need to ask whose it was. _

_"Drink from me, my love..." She held her wrist to him, placing it over his lips. "Take my blood and live forever..."_

Gabriel sat up quickly, a tojo blade in his hand as he waved it in front of him blindly. The darkness of the cabin swirled around his eyes. He could hear someone pacing nervously in the shadows as the door opened and shut once more. Cautiously, Gabriel got off the cot and walked to the door, listening hard. He could only the pounding of the rain against the deck above him, running down into the corridors and dampening the floor. He opened the door quietly and looked down the hall, not finding anyone. The other direction was empty as well. He put the tojo blade back in his sleeve and walked to the steps to the deck. Just as he reached for the handle, the door was thrown open by a strong gust of wind. He could hear Janos laughing in the darkness.

"This is the last time I listen to you about when and when not to sail, Gabriel!" He shouted as the ship dipped down into a steep wave and water splashed onto the deck. The hunter slammed the door to the cabin and braced himself against a wall as the water struck him hard. It nearly knocked the wind from him. After a moment it passed and he was left soaked after mere seconds of being outside. The rain pounded against him, penetrating his coat and finding its way to his numerous pockets and weapons. _Carl is going to kill me for getting them wet, _he thought to himself. When the crossbow had been rusted over Carl wouldn't speak to him for an hour and only mumbled about how careless the hunter had been. Gabriel took it upon himself to remind Carl that it was his idea to use the holy water at the Church.

"It would stand to reason we run into a storm whenever you're on board, Janos."

"I'm always on board when you are. Who's the bad luck now?" The Hungarian laughed heartily and gripped the thick ropes on the mast. "BRACE YOURSELF!"

Gabriel looked ahead, watching as the ship rose over a monster of a wave and headed downwards. He felt the wind push him back against the wall of the ship, pinning him in place as the water rushed up to meet him.

Just as the wave passed he saw the white blur in the sky. There was a cackle and the whole crew went into frenzy. The wave passed over them as everyone looked around, craning their heads skyward as the menacing shadows passed over them. The sound of claws meeting wood alerted Gabriel. He turned to face the tall mast as the lightning crackled.

There were three of them. The thralls of Elizabeth Bathory laughed manically and swooped down on the crew below.

Before he could do anything, the door swung open and he was nabbed from the side. Elizabeth grinned as she slammed him against the wall, knocking him senseless.

* * *

_He wasn't sure what to expect the first time Mina allowed him into the bedroom. She stood in front of the desk, looking down at the candles that cast golden light over her body. She reached up and pulled off her bodice, dropping it to the floor. _

_"Mina..."_

_She looked over her shoulder at him. _

_"Do you not want this?" She asked. Gabriel was at a loss for words. He blushed. Did he want that? Yes, although he found it a little prudent to simply blurt that out to her. Mina got the message somehow, probably from the small, boyish grin on his face._

_"Then help me remove this awful thing," she said, removing her skirt, bustle, and the thin corset cover. He walked over slowly as she lifted her brown hair off her back, allowing the lacings to show from her back. He undid the bow and started yanking at the strings. _

_"I don't know how you wear these things all day," he commented dryly._

_"They're terrible," she said as he pulled at the lacing some more. "You have to start at the top by the way otherwise you'll never get it off."_

_"Now you tell me," he said moving his hand up to the top._

_"Well I would have thought you to be familiar with these things."   
"Maybe in a past life," he said, working his way down. She smiled again, taking a deep breath as the corset fell down her hips to the floor. She turned and looked him in the eye, reaching a hand up to his face._

_"I don't want to hear about any of those stories, thank you very much," she said with a small smile before moving her hands to his shoulders, easing the coat down his arms. Gabriel just started kissing her, unable to stop._

She could hear someone knocking on glass. The hollow pounding filled her skull with a dizzying throb as she opened her eyes and blinked. The window behind her slid open and there was the sound of struggle as someone pushed themselves through the open space.

Sleep took her again for a moment, but not enough to drown out the sounds of the cries that followed.

"HELP! SOMEBODY!"

"What the...?!" Mina sat up just as Carl tumbled through the window, performing a summersault before striking the bed headfirst and allowing himself to go limp. She walked over to the other side of the bed, fighting off a bought of vertigo as she offered her hand to the fallen friar. "Goodness, Carl. Are you alright?"

Carl didn't say anything. He grabbed her hand and kicked up to his quickly, dropping his heavy bags to the floor immediately after he had righted himself. Mina moved her feet just a split second before the leather sack hit the ground.

"Where is he?" Carl demanded suddenly. "Where's Van Helsing?"   
It took Mina a moment to reply. She rubbed her temples.

"I don't know. He must have left. Oh God, Carl! He must have been heading to Cachtice alone!"

"He already left?" Carl asked. Mina nodded slowly, not able to hear anything from her house, and she knew better than to hope that he had stuck around for any longer. He grabbed hold of the bags again and walked awkwardly through the room. "I have to follow him. He probably went to San Marino. It's one of the only ports in Italy that sails to Transylvania this late in the year. Have to find him..."

"Wait, Carl." Mina said. "I'm going with you."

"Like hell you are."

"FRIAR CARL!" He stopped short and faced her. "You call yourself a man of God and yet you have the mouth of a sailor."

"First, I never once called myself a 'man of God' and second, I'm just a friar. I can curse all I bloody want, especially when trapped in situations of intense peril." Mina rolled her eyes and grabbed her bow and quiver regardless, grabbing hold of her old winter coat from the pile of clothing in her wardrobe before following after the friar again. "What did I just tell you?"

"First, I never once took orders from you Carl and second, I am the only person in Rome with any type of archery skills, so I will come along if I bloody well want to, which I am sick of not doing in situations of intense peril." She walked to the front door, pushing passed him as she threw her coat over her shoulders. "And if you even think about spraying with any type of narcotic gas I will give you something to curse about."

She threw open the door swiftly and stepped out into the night, leaving Carl mumbling every curse he knew about women.

* * *

Author's Notes: First off, I have to thank Grissom, the very awesome writer who betas this story and worked her butt off to get these two chapters finished, not only on short notice (especially for this chapter) but also with my nagging her maliciously and setting deadlines. Thank you so much! I can't say it enough. You are awesome and I am so sorry for the way I treated you!

So many reviews for Mina to kick Elizabeth's butt...

Reviews:

**_DoodilyDoo_**: Hope the updates had enough Elizabeth/Gabriel fighting to appease you for now. Perhaps more violence is in order...

**_J_**: Mina's skin is immune to ash because of the Excalibur shard. If she were shot with one, she wouldn't be so lucky, but her skin is virtually indestructible by modern weaknesses to vampires.

I didn't have much of a choice which Van Helsing I got. My parents got it for me as a birthday present. Not that I'm ungrateful. Any Hugh Jackman is better than nothing, although I would have liked the tour of Frankenstein's lab.

Must go search for Ellen.

**_Random-Battlecry_**: You printed out all of Shards of Avalon? Last I heard it was 97 pages long (without review responses). That's awesome. I'm glad you enjoyed it! I would have hated for you to spend that much paper and not like something.

Carl is great and David Wenham is awesome too!

Jinette is needed. The way I see it, Van Helsing's duty is to destroy demons, and it's ironic that Jinette is the one demon he can't destroy. He's the villain that's not really a villain. Plus Gabriel's reaction to him is always good. And I can't kill Jinette until he finds out about the bar maid and Carl!

I am happy to have inspired you! Nice to know that some stories are becoming Carl-centric! Long like Daisy Wenham! The fake barfing was awesome!

**_HyperCaz_**: George Lucas really shouldn't have made the prequels to Star Wars, although Episode 1 did have some reputable performances (Ray Park, Ewan McGregor, and I loved Liam Niesen). Of course it also starred Jake Lloyd (cringes). Prequels and sequels... the sure signs of greed.

WHOO HOOOO! Chocolate fountain! Thank you!

**_Darkchylde_**: Mina kicking Gabriel's ass? I was pondering the idea.

I've never seen Stargate: Atlantis. I'm much too consumed with Stargate: SG-1 right now (LONG LIVE O'NEILL!). My friend just got me into it and I adore it.

I'm getting really freaked out of University. I don't wanna do dissertations! Good luck with yours though, by the way.

I think I'd like to keep Gabriel and werewolves away from one another for a while. Well, if he had a flamethrower with him it would be a glorious affair!

Thanks for telling me you were **_fenestrae_**. Lord knows I'd leave two responses to both names.

**_Lady sernna Valerious_**: Vampires and Valerious...a match made in heaven. Love the new user name, although I will miss the old one.

Good to hear that you got lot's of chocolate. The people in my town like to give out potato chips. It totally turned me off to trick-or-treating. Now I just buy the discount candy from Walmart afterwards. It's equally as good.

Sounds like an exciting day at school! Nothing like that ever happens at our school. Well, there were those bomb threats...

**_Emeraldjewel_**: She's going to Transylvania, but not with Gabriel. I want to experiment a little with her and Carl's relationship (no, not like that. She'd never be unfaithful to Gabriel).

**_Toto 3_**: Thank you very much for everything you said. I'm happy the characters are dead on because I would hate to have them any other way. If they're not right, it's not Fanfiction in my opinion.

Bubble gum head? That's an awesome comment. Very original. I laughed when I read that. Excellent description!

**_Trinity Van Helsing_**: Nice suggestions. I considered an ending where those things happened. Perhaps I should work them into an epilogue...

Brad Pitt was hot in Interview with the Vampire, but then again, so was Antonia Banderas.

**_Susan_**: I was not expecting an entire character profile when I asked for suggestions about the ending. Well Done! I copied and pasted everything you said in a writing file and saved it in my Van Helsing file for later reference. I would probably have to alter some characteristics a little, with your permission of course, if I used her, just so she fit into the Vampire Hierarchy I have already established but I am certainly trying to work the idea into the plot. It would give me another way to free Van Helsing of the thrall venom.

She has a very contradictory mix of species (and I love contradictions in Van Helsing). If you have ever seen the movie Blade, being a vampire and a human at the same time really bites (pardon the pun). I mean, you have a lust for blood and death and destruction but at the same time you have morals that need to be addressed and dealt with as they interfere. I would have to work in the history a little, since if she was the first vampire in history, there would need to be a reason for it and I was intending for the King and Queen of the Damned to be the first regardless. She could be the child of the King and Queen, but then how would she be alive? I'll see what I can do with it. Very nice profile though! Very original method of giving ideas for a story!

**_Ginnia_**: Building upon Susan's character huh? I think I would have to draw the line at magickal abilities such as molten silver and light star since I would commonly associate those more with witches and mages rather than vampires. As I wrote to Susan, I will more than likely alter the character slightly so the history fits into the Vampire Hierarchy a little better and she's not all powerful. Even a rose has thorns.

I really appreciate the idea! Thank you both so much for your suggestions! I saved your review in the same file as Susan's so I have them both on hand for when I reach Cachtice.

**_Gothicvamp8000_**: Jack the Ripper is fascinating! I have all these books on him and have bookmarked so many websites on him. He's amazing to study!

I'm glad I'm doing the blood countess properly. I have to make her a little more vein though. Poor her, so vein and she can't even see herself in a mirror.

**_Shadowsage_**: YAY! Long live Internet! I couldn't live without the Internet. Just last week I was offline for only three days and I realized how much I missed it. (Starts stroking her modem) Yes baby, I missed you... (Hugs modem).

Thanks for telling me about dissertations! I am so nervous about graduating!

**_Star Magel_**: The way you described Van Helsing as a vampire was so cool. I could totally see that as being his look, especially as a thrall. Maybe he will become a thrall...just to be evil...

The venom would definitely effect him differently, and I don't have to say why...and I wouldn't anyways.


	8. The Problem with Vampires

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts in this story pertaining to Van Helsing are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur writing effort and is for entertainment purposes only.

* * *

Chapter 8: The Problem With Vampires

_He felt at peace with the world, and that was something that Gabriel hardly ever felt. He allowed his arms to descend into the thick, inky liquid that surrounded him as his lover ran her hands over his torso and licked the blood from his body. He blinked. He found himself within arms reach of Elizabeth Bathory, standing waist high in a pool of blood. Her tongue moved over his lips again as she hissed. She moved down his throat, softly biting him as she reached his collarbones. With a loud hiss, she jumped forward and bit down hard into his chest._

Gabriel thrust forward with his tojo blade, but was met only with the sound of a cackle and the rush of wind. He jumped up to his feet, looking around frantically for Elizabeth. The countess was gone. The staircase was empty and every sensation of evil had disappeared. He grabbed the door handle and swung the door open without another thought.

His whole face was burning as if set aflame. He dropped the tojo blades, crying out in anguish as the pain consumed him. He kicked the door shut furiously, blocking out the light. He tried to control his breathing, his chest pounding for air. The heat faded from his face as a chill spread from his neck to his forehead. The blisters vanished quickly and slowly but surely, he was himself again.

_God damn it,_ he cursed himself, getting back to his feet. He snatched his ornately designed bandana from his pocket and covered his bare skin from the nose down. The rest of his face was hidden by the wide brim of his hat.

He could feel the curse of the vampire weighing heavily in his veins now, almost like euphoria as it spread from his fingertips to his shoulders. He took off his glove and found his hand pale as Mina's face, blue veins spreading up to his forearms and beyond. He reached apprehensively to the bite on his neck, regretting doing it afterwards. The skin was inflamed and infected, coagulated gore still dripping from the wound. His eyes watered from the heat radiating from it.

_This is just brilliant, isn't it Gabriel? The sun's up. A few hours more before you're sucking blood and whimpering at her feet like a dog._

_No,_ he thought, pounding his fist against the wall. _She won't break me. She won't._

_Oh, so naïve Gabriel._ There was a cold laugh. Inside of his mind, in the dark recesses of memory and time was Elizabeth Bathory's cackle. _Take a look outside, will you? I left you a present. Something you'll find most delightful._

Collecting his tojo blades, he opened the door again, hanging his head low behind the rim of his hat. The shadow protected him, but only just. He could still feel his flesh tingle at the heat that fell over his black clad body. He kicked his feet a little, drying blood sticking to the base of his boots. He lifted his head cautiously, looking straight ahead at the ship deck.

It was a battlefield, littered with corpses, drenched in blood and torn flesh. Gabriel couldn't breathe as he looked over the crewman; their mouths open; their eyes wide and staring…

And there, at the mast was the writhing body of Janos. He was bound with thick ropes and covered in small bites. Gabriel ran to him, grabbing at the ropes in a futile attempt to free him. Janos groaned.

"KILL ME!" He shouted at Gabriel, still struggling. "That bitch countess and her thralls. Destroy me before I destroy you."

"There's still a chance," the hunter said, untying the rope. Janos groaned loudly and demanded for him to stop again. "If I can kill her, I can…"

"No." Janos's head hung down, hidden behind a layer of his blood covered black curls. Gabriel stopped pulling at the ropes. "It's too late for me. You know that. End her line, fedeles zsebóra. Do not allow her evil to be birthed in me."

His whole body went rigid. Gabriel's eyes burned as the thought of actually killing a man came into his head. The thought of slashing Janos's throat, one of the few people in the world he had laughed with once upon a time; one of the few men in the world who had a name for him that didn't sound like 'murderer'.

But in that moment, he realized he didn't have a choice. He took up a tojo blade from his sleeve. Janos's eyes closed, his breathing slowing. Gabriel took aim, shut his eyes and slashed the spinning blade across his friend's throat with an enraged cry.

Blood spilled down the front of the body and splashed out onto the hunter's bare face. He shouted out every curse he knew to Elizabeth Bathory. He threw the tojo blade into the deck of the ship, hurling his fists onto the ground.

"GOD DAMN YOU!"

* * *

"You don't understand!" Mina protested to the harbour master again as they marched across the dock. "We have to set sail tonight. It is imperative that we reach Transylvania within a certain number of hours."

"So you've been saying," the harbour master said, looking over his parchment again, pretending to be gazing at something interesting while staring blankly, as if straight through the list of cargo and ships in his port. "It is also imperative that these ships stay on course. I've already had one ship leave in that direction and that's all that's going in that direction. Good night, Madam." He gave a small salute, unsure of how to behave given the state of things. He had been approached by a woman – dressed in trousers and a suit coat, no less – and a friar, both on the verge of hysteria, babbling about needing a ride across the Adriatic Sea.

"I take it you're not doing any better than me?" Carl said from behind her. Mina groaned, shaking her head. She stared out at the sea, watching the sun come up in the distance, just a sliver, but a warning nonetheless. Mina hung her head in defeat and gazed at the dock. _There is nothing you can do. Even if you did charter a ship, you wouldn't find him before he becomes a thrall. And then there's no use._

Mina clenched her fist.

_No,_ she thought, _she's not going to have him. Gabriel Van Helsing is mine. _

She punched her hand and turned back to face Carl. "Give me a weapon," she commanded, "And something to hide my face. We're leaving this port tonight."

"As normal citizens or as fugitives?" Carl asked, and was very worried when Mina didn't reply.

* * *

The sun had become something he could depend on. After five years of constant movement, his life shifting in and out of balance, the sun and moon were the two things that never stopped rising and falling, yielding dominance to the other when their own twelve hours were up. He would stand on a chair in his darkened room in the Vatican to look through the small, dusty window in his room as the sun rose in the sky. The golden brilliance slowly overtook Rome in shades of red and oranges before swallowing it completely with the cerulean sky.

_And now look at you, cowering behind a mask and a hat for fear the sun will consume you entirely,_ he scowled at the notion and looked up and over the walls of ship. He could see the shore not far off from him, a sight which would have been a relief hours ago, when the crew was alive. Now that the odds were slightly in Elizabeth's favour, the shore was a sight met with dread.

Gabriel swiftly moved to the stern of the ship, checking all his pockets and the compartments in his jacket that his weapons were secure before leaping over the side of the ship and into the frigid waters below.

He held fast to his hat and bandana, ensuring that impact did not leave him vulnerable to the sun. His legs struck first and sent a chill up his spine while his flesh stung, before even that disappeared with the rising water.

Despite the large amount of metal he was carrying, he was an unnaturally good swimmer. He kicked himself back to the surface and started swimming in the wake of the ship at first before steering away from it, propelling himself inland towards the coast. There was no telling which coast it was, Elizabeth had taken care of that, but he no longer cared where he was heading anymore, as long as it was in the general direction of Transylvania.

* * *

"Get that cargo up on deck!" The captain shouted; his voice was thick with the makings of a cold and his throat was stinging, but the sun was coming up on the horizon and they were already behind schedule. "Put your backs in to it gentleman! This century please!"

He put his hands on his hips and shrugged his shoulders, groaning loudly as the cargo got loaded at the same pace regardless of how much he ranted. He waltzed over to his cabin door, shouting another insult over his shoulder before stepping inside and slamming the door behind him.

"Lazy bunch of dogs," he said, grabbing the bottle of whisky from his desk. He yanked the cork from the bottle, just as a pistol cocked and came to rest at the base of his skull.

"Stop," an alto voice commanded. The Captain's eyes narrowed as the vaguely British voice spoke. He went to turn only to have the pistol pushed deeper into his thick neck flesh. "My associate will disarm you."

He rolled his eyes as the small figure emerged from the shadows.

"Is this your first time hijacking a boat or something sir, because you're doing a terrible job?" The Captain said, pointing at the small assistant.

"I told you this wouldn't work," Carl said, pulling his hood from his face. Mina groaned and shot Carl a sharp glare. The Captain laughed and turned, unafraid.

"Kindly put that pistol away," he said. Mina hesitated, but eventually complied, sliding it back into the holster on her hip. "Very good." He balled his hand into a fist and went to punch her. Before the blow could come, however, the Captain keeled over onto the ground, landing at Mina's feet. She looked up at Carl, who was holding a smooth club in his hands.

"I told you this wasn't going to work," he said, "But does anyone listen to me. No, they never do. Always rushing off, wanting to play hunter in the big world."

"Help me," Mina said, her teeth clenched as she took the thick wrists of the man and rolled him over. Carl grabbed the man's ankles, but didn't stop his rant.

"You know you're just like him. Always doing things the hard way. No, Carl, let's not try and reason with people through conversation. Let's immediately resort to violence…" She reached in her coat and yanked out the few bowstrings she had within, their strong cords the only material she had to tie the Captain up with. "What are you doing now?"

"Tying him up," Mina said simply, halting her movements. Carl was getting a look on his face that surely meant, 'You're an idiot for thinking of such a plan.' "What would you suggest I do?"

"Finally! You're willing to listen to me." He swatted her hands away and stood up again, grabbing the bottle of whisky from the desk. "Don't say a word."

Mina opened her mouth to ask him what he was doing, but she mutely obeyed, watching him as he poured the whisky on the man's face to rouse him.

The Captain coughed and spluttered as Carl emptied the bottle on him. "What the hell do you think you're doing you bastard?" Mina took a step back from him, watching as Carl fumbled with the knife he drew from within his robes. The Captain jerked back at the sight of the blade. "Now, now, what are you going to do with that?"

Carl swallowed hard and loomed over him, his jaw tightened. "You're going to keep us on board. And you're going to change course and head for Western Czechoslovakia."

The Captain was silent. He cocked a brow. Mina looked at Carl, wondering what would happen next.

Finally, the Captain laughed. "That's all you wanted? A ride?" He laughed again, harder this time, before breaking into a coughing fit. It subsided soon and he continued. "Put the knife down friar. I don't like men coming aboard my ship and demanding to stow away, but I can always be told to make two stops. For that dagger, I'll make hundreds."

Carl glanced at Mina.

She shrugged. It was all she really could do at that point.

* * *

The cold was starting to wear him thin. His limbs felt like lead and by the time he did reach the rocky coastline and he flopped onto a shore looking like a drowned kitten. Gabriel crawled up to the forest and finally stopped to take a breather. The whole world was spinning wildly again, and in the shade of the trees he finally looked around with his vampire eyes.

_He had only ever heard the accounts once, long ago, while visiting the Order's dungeons. A female vampire was watching him from the confines of her prison cell, staring at him with bright, red eyes. "You're the hunter who kills his prey?"  
"I could say the same about you," he replied. The vampire brushed her hair back behind her ear and smiled._

_"Are you expecting me to say I deserved that?"_

_"The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem," Gabriel crossed his arms proudly. The vampire laughed._

_"I wouldn't be talking," she said quickly. "You kill with discrimination, and even I can't admit to that."  
There was silence for a moment. The vampire reached through the bars of her prison and smiled softly. "Do you have a cigarette at all?"_

_He was just inches away from her fingertips. They hovered over his chest, just brushing over his trench coat and shirt. Gabriel didn't move, unafraid by her advances. He shook his head. "I don't smoke."_

_"Good choice," she pulled back her hand, "It'll kill you."_

_"Not that you have anything to worry about."_

_"You're the only thing I have to worry about, isn't that right?" She looked around her prison cell once more, sighing deeply. "The view isn't good from in here."_

_"I heard vampires could find beauty anywhere."_

_"Rumours," she scoffed, "Vampire eyes cannot find beauty is places so…Catholic."_

_He laughed a little at that. The vampire turned and stared at him, entranced by him for a moment._

_"Through your own eyes, your face is so human. It's so plain to see a nose, a mouth, two eyes…to a vampire all of those features burn with supernatural clarity, as if they are set ablaze by hell's fire." She faced him fully, her chest pressed against the bars of the cell. "If you saw yourself through a vampire's eyes you would appear so different."_

_"Indulge me," he said, challenging her. The vampire rose to the occasion it seemed, looking over his shoulder at the monks behind him, drawing another beast into a cage. Gabriel ignored them and waited for her answer. _

_The vampire slipped into her native tongue and spoke in smooth French._

_"Your face is smooth, not wrinkled by stress and pain. No scars mar your flesh for it appears as mine does, etched in the fabric of humans as if carved from stone. Your body is human, yes, but your eyes betray you. In your eyes I see..." Her voice quieted as she turned back into the darkness. Gabriel became aware of eyes on him, and he turned. Jinette stared at him intently._

_"Here to help transfer the prisoner?" The Cardinal asked. The hunter said nothing as the cell door opened and the vampire was led out, surrounded by attendants carrying crucifixes. She took a step towards Gabriel and smiled, whispering the final word to him sensuously. _

_"Blood."_

As he lay in the forest, pulling off his layers of soaked clothing in the safety of the trees, he found what she had been speaking of. The world burned with intense clarity. The trees seemed greener, the ground seemed browner…everything was rich with colour and burning in his vision, "As if touched by heaven's light." He could never describe it in words, and feared he never would be able to, but he found that every vampire could find solace in such a world, even without sunlight. He caught his breath while losing himself into the beauty of the world.

* * *

It was still dark as they set sail, and even as Mina stepped out on deck it was still twilight. The moon still shone brightly, the stars still twinkling like diamonds; she found that the air was colder though, sending shivers down her spine as she stared into the navy blue waters.

_"And what's your friend's name Carl?"  
"Silent fellow, ain't he?"  
Mina said nothing, turning over on the bunk to hide her face from the candlelight. The crew was still passing around a flask, playing poker and betting with cigarettes. Carl had joined in not to long ago, winning nearly every round (Mina assumed he wasn't playing fair, judging by his habit of hiding things in his sleeves). _

_"Oh, well that's…" Carl droned off, praying that Mina would say something. _

_So she filled them all in, turning over on the cot and standing up. Her face was hidden by the hood on her coat and she calmly stated, "Harker. My name is Jonathan Harker."_

_And then she walked out of the cabin to the deck._

The helmsman said nothing to her, mumbling to someone that Mina either couldn't see or wasn't there at all. The wind caught her cloak and hair, throwing back the hood. She no longer cared about her identity. Woman or man, she was still getting out of the cramped living quarters and taking in some air.

The sun cast a long stream of light over the open water, covering her face and basking her body in golden rays. She remembered missing the sunshine, and realized that over the course of one year she had gained another dependency on it.

"Ah, sunlight, how one misses it."

Startled, Mina whipped around to face the man who spoken. He turned a little, hidden behind the hood of a black jacket. His face was pale, his eyes an icy blue coloured, and his features were very defined. Mina knew what she was looking at. She was staring into the face of a vampire, and not just any vampire it seemed. This one she knew. The strangest feeling of déjà vu came over her as she stared into his face.

"Darling Mina you look so…human."

She reached for her belt, feeling for the pistol she carried. By the time she had aimed, the vampire had disappeared.

Something dropped down on the deck behind her. Mina turned again, but the vampire had already grabbed her wrists and shaken the gun from her hands before she could use it.

"Did I scare you?"

"Let go of me!" She kicked his shin but his grip didn't loosen.

"You don't recognize me, do you?"

_Jesus, this must be how Van Helsing feels all the time._

She ripped her hands from his grip and punched him, but her fist struck nothing but air. The vampire had disappeared again.


	9. Darker Shades of Black

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts in this story belong to Stephen Sommers, the writer/director of the movie Van Helsing. This is an amateur writing effort and no money was made off this story. It is for entertainment only.

* * *

Chapter 9: Darker Shades of Black

Gabriel was freezing. He had finally dried his clothes enough that they were somewhat comfortable and was starting to climb the steep bank towards Transylvania. He allowed his instincts to take control at that point. They took his mind away from the cold that had settled over his body and started paying attention to the more important things.

_Running water…there's a stream nearby._

_Moss…least I'm heading in the right direction._

He shivered again, buried in his clothing to protect him from the sun. It had moved into the center of the sky now, shining directly on him. The heat itself was making his skin crawl, but offered little protection against the frigid winds that billowed through the trees.

Elizabeth's voice was thankfully gone from his head, but he found little time to celebrate. He was thirsty, he realized, and even though he had taken handfuls from the stream when he passed it, it did nothing. It was wishful thinking to imagine that it would. After all, it was hours into the transformation, and he was already allergic to the sun. Blood would be the only thing that could quench his thirst now. The thought revolted him, but he trudged on.

He thought of Mina often, his thoughts drifting back to her over and over obsessively. He imagined her doing simple things, the sort of things he had taken for granted over the years; reading, writing, grading papers…the true activities of a schoolmarm. He would joke with her about it whenever he could, leaning over her shoulder as she sat at her desk, staring down at the frail pages of a novel in the golden lamp light.

_"You're always reading that same book."_

_"I like it," she'd say, still watching the page rather than him. "I'm not doing it to annoy you."_

_"I never said it annoyed me," he kissed her on the cheek. "It's just it's quite hard to ravage you, my lady, when you're seated so far from the bed." His coy smirk made her finally turn to him, green eyes gleaming with ideas of mischief. "Now, that's getting better."_

Jesus, they were foolish. They were like two lovers in a novel or something, heading towards eloping without wanting to stop. Gabriel had considered running away with her. He considered it often. It was another thought that bounced around in his head as he marched on through the dying forest. It came as natural as breath to him. Whenever he saw her, he saw her on a horse with him, riding off into the last of the sunset (or sunrise, but the sunsets were always more romantic). The ideals of just escaping the tightening clutches of Jinette and the Vatican were gaining more and more appeal.

From him anyways. He knew better than to decide that fate for Mina. She was traditional for the most part. She barely allowed him to touch her for the first month or two, let alone see her even partially nude. There was always a restraining hand in his way from loosening the corset lacings, always a sharp tongue preventing him from touching any of her more private areas. She believed her actions left her as the fallen woman, a fornicator, a sinner, and even though her belief in Christ was waning, he could see the sadness in her eyes the first time they made love.

And then there was Jonathan. It was like he haunted the very shadows Gabriel shrouded himself in. He was always there, watching over his ex-wife with an intensity that truly bothered the hunter. He couldn't remember Jonathan. He couldn't remember how much he meant to Mina.

But Mina could remember. Mina could remember everything.

Gabriel dropped to his knees suddenly, cringing in pain. His neck was throbbing as if someone was thrusting a white hot poker into the flesh slowly. He heaved forward, his stomach doing flip flops and his body stiffening. Christ, it hurt. It hurt terribly. The ache moved through every vein, enveloping his brain from the root to the top of the skull. He was brought to his hands, in a crawl, looking down at the ground with his pain filled eyes. He squinted so hard that tears dropped to the dirt below him, freezing at his eyelashes from the wind.

"This is how I want you to greet me, lover," Elizabeth said, whispering in his ear as she loomed at his side. She brushed her jet black hair from her face, coming closer with a menacing look in her bright red eyes. "On your knees, submissive, completely giving into me like my slave. And when you rise you will accept me as your mate, and drink from my veins. Then, and only then, you will reap the benefits of this power I have given you."

Gabriel gritted his teeth and smirked despite the agony his body was in. He managed to speak at last. "I don't want your power."

He tackled Elizabeth to the ground, but when he opened his eyes next, he found that she was just an illusion. There was no one else in the forest but him.

* * *

_Mina was wearing a mask. She stared at him through the metallic bands that tied around her face. He gently reached orward and lifted it from her head, the thin chains that hung from it in semi circles jingling as he removed it. She was silent, watching him carefully with her cat-like features, unmoving like a statue. _

_"Mina?"_

_Silence. She looked away from him, straight ahead at the golden walls of the chamber they were in. The maroon fabric of her dress collected at her legs, her corset bound with thick leather straps as leather cuffs and sheer fabrics draped down her arms. He nudged closer to her, snapping his fingers in front of her eyes. "Mina, answer me."  
"Why should I?" She demanded, turning slightly to meet his face. The collar at her throat tightened a moment, digging into her flesh. Blood dripped from beneath it at a slow but steady pace, like a pulse. "Answer you? You never answer me. Every question is given a shady response is if you are tying scarves about my eyes. You use me Gabriel as an outlet for your rebellious nature, crawling back to my doorstep like a desperate whore just looking for another night in bed with me. And for what? So you can run away by the time the sun comes up as if the carriage is going to turn back into a pumpkin the second dawn rolls around?"_

_He was left speechless. Mina's cruelty was always seen and never heard, unless you counted the low growls and piercing hisses when she turned into a vampire. But her words were hardly ever cruel, and even more seldom were they cruel to him._

_"That was unfair."_

_"Unfair, Gabriel? Do you even know the meaning of that word?" Her eyes bore into his soul. "It leaves a taste in your mouth as stale and acrid as rotten milk and thoughts as hazy as the clouds in your memory. You cannot comprehend the meaning of unfair. You do not have a clue what it means, do you?"_

_"I don't have a clue?" he was shouting now, "You don't understand what it's like to be ordered around like some god damned servant, obeying the laws of a God you hardly believe in."_

_"Oh, poor Gabriel, the dying martyr; the saviour of men, charging forward into battle with the shadows cast by God himself. The hunter of hunters, the evil of all evils…the man who looks in the mirror and sees a reflection only the devil could leave." Mina looked towards him again. She didn't look like herself, the demonic being before him, with her eyes dolled up in black kohl and hair in tight ringlets in a halo of burnished copper around her head. "Oh to be the fallen one, thrown down from the clouds to the steps that Peter built. Oh to be the wandering soldier, following the laws of a demon in an angel's costume. Oh to be the great Gabriel Van Helsing, who kills the Count Dracula and sleeps with his mistress."_

_"And what of you? To be so powerful and frightened to use that power? You don't know me. You don't know anything about me."_

_"You accuse me of fright? You run when someone reaches out their hand and promises you the past, and yet you use that fact as an excuse for your helplessness."_

_"I didn't run from you."_

_"I didn't promise you the past."_

_"What does it matter, huh? What does it matter to you? It's my problem, my brain. You don't have anything to do with it." Gabriel's jaw tightened as he reached forward to her and grabbed her chin, forcefully. "Get out of here, Elizabeth. She's not your property."_

_The collar tightened on Mina's throat suddenly. Her back arched as blood streamed down her chest, soaking into the dress. Gabriel allowed her to drop back onto the bed, trying to remind himself that all this was just a dream, and that was all. _Mina's fine, she's fine…

_"Why should I?"_

_The room changed suddenly, the golden walls and candles disappearing, immediately transforming into a darkened tower chamber. Mina's body disappeared behind him as he was thrown against the mattress someone tackling into him from the side. _

_Lightning struck and the face came into view. It was Mina again, staring down at him with ferocity in her eyes that only a vampire could possess. Her appearance was different again, her black corset and skirt flooding over his body as if it were alive. Her hair was jet black and she was wearing a silver crown, one that wrapped around her scalp and towered over her head with diamonds hanging from every band. _

_"Why should I let her go? Do you not like this body, Gabriel? You've touched every inch of it, kissed all the important parts, held her memory so close to your heart that even now, as your strength fades and you bend to my will you are forced to remember her over and over and over again. You're relentless Gabriel!" She threw her fists against his chest, lowering to his face. The lightning flashed again, the light showing the face for who it really was: Elizabeth. The darkness came over once again and it was Mina's face once more, transformed by her inner evil. The pale skin was no longer warm but frigid as her fingers crawled over his chest. The blue veins were more pronounced, the eyes more violent and wild. "You hold her close to you Gabriel, closer than that pathetic friar that consumes the past five years of your known existence, but what of before…long before that. What of the beginning of your wretched mortal existence? What of the immortal one?"_

_Gabriel pushed back suddenly, rolling Mina onto her back on the bed, holding her down by her shoulders. The dress came alive again, wrapping about his legs and hands like ink. He ignored it. "And so what? So what of the immortal life? Stop taunting me with her body and her face! Show yourself!"_

_Mina laughed cruelly, her fangs all the more evident as her mouth opened wider and wider. The laugh became a cackle within moments as she rose off the bed, regardless of how much strength he pinned her down with. She lifted herself to his ear and whispered, "Show yourself."_

_Then her fangs pierced his throat, and the final image that filled his mind was Mina, lying on her back in the snow, her eyes closing in defeat._

_And then came the faintest of whispers, as if the wind itself delivered the message to him, and it was the sound of Mina calling his name._

* * *

Carl had a headache, not uncommon for one to have when they had been up into the wee hours of morning, guzzling back ale with the other sailors on the ship. He had been hung over before, more times than he could count actually, and even though he was considered a genius (mainly by the muses in his own head), he could create weapons of mass destruction that could obliterate the forces of evil, but for the life of him he could not concoct the cure for a hangover.

Someone shook him to wake up. He told whoever it was to go away, at least he think he said that. His tongue felt thick and swollen and the syllables weren't coming out right. But he waved the person on anyway, attempting to tell them the dreams of sexual ravishment were much more interesting than the waking world.

That's when Mina lost her temper. She proceeded to dump a full bucket of soapy water over his head.

"God damn woman I'm trying to sleep here!" His ears were ringing as he sat up quickly. Too quickly. Carl's already throbbing head struck the base of the top bunk with an agonizing crack, one that made Mina wince. She doubled back, turning away from the enraged friar so that his flailing arms wouldn't catch her. "You bloody bastard! I'll tear you limb from limb!"

Carl rolled off the bunk, landing in a heap on the floor. He jumped to his feet, armed with a silver stake and a bottle of ale he had kept hidden in his sleeve from the night before. Mina gave him a warning glare as he tried – and failed – to remain calm.

"What do you think you're doing?" He demanded, crossing his arms in what Mina found to be a larger version of a child when they don't get their way.

"We've arrived, by the way. The Captain wants us off so he can continue to his destination as soon as he can."

Carl hesitated a moment, unfolding his arms. "Well, in that case…you could have avoided the bucket."

"I doubt that very much, friar," Mina said. "Now let's get going. We have a lot to do, and there is very little time left."

* * *

He crawled when he couldn't walk, and he slept when he passed out from exhaustion. Sleep would come to him every now and then, just long enough for Elizabeth to toy with his memories and thoughts, manipulate his mind to her bidding. He had lost track of the hours, maybe because he wanted to or because they had just slipped from him as everything else had.

The sun was on his left now, setting in the West. _Setting,_ he thought. The sun setting meant that time for him was running out. It meant that his hours as a human were numbered, and his biological clock was starting to break.

Gabriel came to a stop, kneeling as the world spun madly around him. It was all he could do. His body had stopped, the weight of the world crushing every bone in his mangled body. What was the point in continuing forward? Every step led him in her direction. Every time he put his foot forward he played her game of cat and mouse, and for a while he had thought himself the cat. But she was winning now, probably watching him through his own two eyes, smirking coyly as she won her game and slowly started to eat him alive.

He lurched forward again, lying on the ground motionlessly, as the dream consumed him again. The snow whipped around him as the cold wrecked his body with shivers. And suddenly, out of the darkness came the pure white blanket that lay underneath Mina's black clad figure, and there was her whispering voice again, calling for him to come to her.

* * *

_Carl opened the door without knocking, just like he always did. He stepped inside, babbling hurriedly about the Cardinal wanting Gabriel to get dressed and meet him in his office. "I tried to tell him you were still moping around this bloody room but he wouldn't listen to me…Van Helsing?"_

_The friar had taken notice that Gabriel was still lying on the bed, his bandaged back facing the door and his head buried into the flattened pillow. "Van Helsing, are you alright?"_

_Gabriel muttered something. Carl inched closer cautiously, having seen Van Helsing in action and not wanting to tempt the man into something violent. Gabriel repeated what he had just said. "It's not coming back."  
"What's not coming back?" Carl asked, taking another step closer._

_"Take a wild guess, Carl," Gabriel said, looking over his shoulder. "I sit in this room, day after day, and I can't remember a God damn thing."_

_"It'll come back."_

_"No!" Gabriel said, sitting up suddenly. "It's not coming back! None of it! I'm twenty or thirty something years old and I have only two weeks of life in my head. I could have a family or something out there but instead of looking I'm trapped down here in this rat infested hell-hole with nothing to go on but these dreams!"_

_Carl didn't know what to say, if anything. He allowed Van Helsing to vent as much as he liked._

_"I can write in twenty different languages," Gabriel said, pointing shakily at the desk in the corner where pieces of parchment were piled messily. "I can speak in many others and understand books in more dialects than some of the priests know." He took a deep breath, staring at Carl with his pain filled stare. "I know how to handle a gun; how to fight with a sword…I know that from this angle I can incapacitate you in two different ways without you being able to defend yourself. I know all of these useless things, these disconnected instincts, but I don't know who the hell I am!"_

_The friar's mouth went dry. He took a step back from the bed, small and insignificant, but enough that his chances of escape were increased._

_"I'm not going to see the Cardinal," Gabriel said, standing up from the bed. "I'm getting out of here, and you're going to help me."_

_"And how are you going to do that?" Carl asked, taking another step back from the advancing patient. Gabriel didn't say anything. His instincts told him how to move. He threw Carl into the wall by the door and knocked his head against the stones, looking around the room._

_"Well that was easy."_

_

* * *

_

Author's Notes: I haven't died. I've merely been in a state of hibernation. But now I've returned to public life and I've another chapter to show. Sorry about the review responses. I did receive them all but I figured everyone would want to see this before the answers to their reviews. To Grissom, my beta, if you're reading this you have to know that my e-mail is royally screwed because of a virus. When it's all fixed I'll get your e-mail and make my revisions as I need to. Thanks so much!

**_Thank you to all the readers who stuck with this story after a month of no update. I am terribly sorry to have kept you waiting, it was not my intention. Now please, enjoy._**


	10. Losing Grip

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts pertaining to Van Helsing in this story are the property of Stephen Sommers, the director and writer of the original movie. This is an amateur writing effort. No money was made off the writing or posting of this story.

Also, any connections made between this story and real life is purely coincidental.

* * *

Chapter 10: Losing Grip

The bustling port was unlike anything Mina had ever seen before. Rather than having a market place in the center of the city, it seemed like merchants and peddlers simply disembarked and set up shop near the vessels that brought them into port. She regretted riding off the ship considering the hustle and bustle that carried on around her.

Carl peered out from under his cloak, eyeing everyone suspiciously. Mina could feel him tense behind her on the horse.

"Something wrong?"

"You can never be too careful with merchants," he said nervously. "You never know what they may want from you."

"Are you always this paranoid?" she asked, eyes narrowing. Carl shrugged.

"Isn't everyone?"

"Well Gabriel certainly isn't."

"Why do you…?" Carl bit his tongue. He nodded suddenly in agreement, "Quite right."

They stared blankly down the harbour at the chaos that surrounded them. It wasn't triggered by a great deal for foreign objects. It was around the ship that had crashed into the dock, on that happened to be covered in corpses.

"He really doesn't like doing anything the easy way, does he?" Carl asked, directing the question at no one in particular. Mina groaned audibly and rode off in the direction of the ship.

* * *

Gabriel crawled. He didn't care which direction he was traveling in at that point, as long as it felt like his was traveling north.

His fingers and toes were numb. Blood dripped from his neck and out his mouth, streaming down over his chest where is froze his clothing to his skin. It was an awful feeling, one he didn't particularly enjoy, even in his semi-conscious state.

He stopped short, breathing heavily. _You've really done it this time, haven't you Gabriel? _He could hear Carl in his mind. _Rushing into things…pistols drawn…_

_And look at you now, _a voice mocked him, _on your knees just begging for Elizabeth to come and take you._

"NO!" He shouted, throwing his fists into the soil. He heaved forward with a loud cry, his voice cracking and blood flying from his parted lips. "NO! NO! NO! She won't have me…she won't!"

_Gabriel…_Mina's voice again, her haunting whisper; begging, pleading, crying out for help as she lay defeated in the falling snow.

"STOP SHOWING ME THIS!" He cried.

"No." Elizabeth knelt by his side once more. "Just ask for it Gabriel and I'll make the pain stop."

"No…" he whispered.

"What was that?"

"NO!"

There was silence again in the forest, the last sound of his voice fading off into the distance. It was called to her, over the mountains and villages, past the countries he had left to cross, and found its way to her waiting ear. And there, in his mind's eye, he saw her grinning, fangs gleaming, eyes shimmering in happiness, because his cry in anguish meant only one thing: she was winning. Slowly but surely, he was going to lose the battle she had thrown him into, and when he did, she would pick up the pieces.

A branch cracked over to his right. Gabriel shook his head lazily. On any normal day his instincts would cause him to reach for his weapon and prepare for anyone, friend or foe. But the fever made his head feel as if it were filled with water and it was hard to focus on anything but the pounding in his temples.

"Don't move." The voice echoed in his sluggish brain. Gabriel laughed. _You're joking. You must be joking. Oh good God, you just love watching this don't you? _

"You're trespassing on private property. I don't allow any visitors."

He spat out a mouthful of blood onto the ground. The person to his right took another step forward. He could hear the sound the shoe made as it hit the earth, quiet as it was. His body went rigid suddenly as his ears were filled with another sound: the sound of a heart beat.

Gabriel turned his head a little, as much as he could manage with the injury on his throat. The figure was dressed in thick clothing from head to toe and remained sexless, even though they were only a few feet apart. In their right hand was a pistol, aimed at his head, in the left, a silver stake.

_Joy…_

"You're one of those God damn vampires aren't you?"

He spat another mouthful of blood to the ground. "Not yet."

"Than what are you?"

He wheezed, darkness clouding his vision.

"Something else."

* * *

There was something comforting there, being so close to where he had been. Mina knew Gabriel had been there. She knew his scent so clearly she could follow without looking, without thinking. It was the scent of gunpowder and blood, an aroma that left her mouth dry and lips burning, aching for some unconscious need.

Mina caught sight of the black Andalusian in the crowd. It was magnificent, one of the only living creatures spared in the attack to the ship. She bit her bottom lip a little and dismounted, moving through the crowd towards the horse.

"Where are you going?" Carl shouted, but his voice went unheard over the sea of people swarming around the ship. Mina's hair disappeared into them.

The friar groaned. It was one thing to deal with Gabriel's constant disappearance. That he could handle. For five years he had been experiencing Gabriel's vanishing act. One minute the hunter could be seen, fedora moving through the crowd of people, the next, it was gone. Normally, Mina was the dependable one. She was always in her home in Italy, never far from there. But now it was different. Mina was different. She was suddenly becoming Gabriel.

His horse paced restlessly. He scanned the crowd again, searching for any sight of her black coat and hat, the slightest flash of her hair…but the pandemonium around him made it hard to see anyone in particular.

Suddenly he say he jumping from the ship's hull, landing gracefully on the ground below. She had something hidden under her jacket, protruding from her back next to the quiver of arrows and bow. Carl recognized the shape. He saw the glint of steel and knew immediately what it was: she had Gabriel's crossbow.

His eyes narrowed though. She was heading away from him rather than towards. _Where the hell is she going?_ He tried to ride towards her but the mob was impenetrable to even his pony. Carl squinted and found Mina untying Gabriel's horse quietly, without the notice of the guards clearing off the deck. Any second though, and they would take notice.

Carl thought quickly. "Diversion…must create a diversion…" He dug through the pockets in his robes, fumbling with stakes and bottles of Holy Water before finding what he was looking for. The tiny shafts were no larger than cigarettes with a short fuse at each end. He looked off in Mina's direction, nearly dropping the fire crackers all over the ground. He managed to light them and toss them into the crowd just as she grabbed the lead rope.

SNAP! CRACK! BANG!

Screams echoed through the harbour. Mina was halfway onto the horse's back when the stallion was spooked. It no longer cared about its rider. The beautiful animal reared and took off, dragging Mina with it across the square.  
"CARL!"

"Sorry!" He shouted, riding after her.

Mina dug her nails into the horse's back and hoisted herself off the ground. The constant rocking back and forth of the body made it hard not to slip, but she managed to get one good kick off the ground and throw herself head-first over the back, hanging off with her legs on the left and torso on the right.

She twisted awkwardly to get out of the way of the crowds, but couldn't do a very good job. Her head was thrown into the ribcage of a merchant who failed to get out of her way fast enough. It caused her body to spin clockwise, and when she finally accomplished a sitting position, she was riding backwards.

"Just perfect…" Mina mumbled, swinging her legs over the opposite sides quick enough that she stayed on the horse. She grabbed hold of the halter and held on for dear life.

* * *

_Carl was wearing that infernal jester costume again. He sat down on the floor next to Mina's throne. She was seated lazily in it, wearing a red dress the colour of blood while her long, curled hair hung down to the floor, adorned with flowers and jewels._

_"And look who it is, Carl: The Vatican's warrior, back from the dead."_

_"In what distant deeps or skies burnt the fire of thine eyes?" Carl asked, reciting William Black while playing with the bells that hung from the hat of his costume. Mina turned to face Gabriel as he stood in front of the two. _

I think I was enjoying the other dream more, _he thought wearily, growing tired of unconsciousness. What was Elizabeth going to do to him this time? Berate him about not having a soul?_

_"I'm nobody, who are you? Are you a nobody too?" Carl fell back, screeching with laughter from Emily Dickinson's poetry. Mina rolled her eyes and stood up from her throne._

_"You know it's strange. I've seen all your memories Gabriel. Every single one of them. But it is these two that you hold dear." She scoffed, glancing over her shoulder at Carl, who was still on the ground laughing. "A brilliant friar with a knack for invention and homicide…and a melancholic vampire with a fear of her power. I should love to meet these two."_

_"I wouldn't count on that."_

_"Oh, really?" She asked, walking around him, circling to keep him on his toes. "So sure of that answer, but you have seen it, just as I have. Mina and Carl dying in the snow."_

_"It's not going to happen," he repeated himself. _

_Mina smiled coyly. The vision was a flash, as quick as lightning, but Gabriel memorized it. He saw two horses moving across the countryside. One horse carried Carl, dressed in his usual brown robes that flew behind him like a demon with broken wings. The other was his, but the rider was smaller, dressed in clothing that hung off their body like bags. _

_"Still think that it's not going to happen?"_

_"Leave them out of this," he commanded again._

_"You're hardly in the position to make demands." She replied, sounding somewhat offended at his words. _

_"I was angry with my friend: I told my wrath, my wrath did end. I was angry with my foe: I told it not, my wrath did grow. And I watered it in fears, Night and morning with my tears, and I sunned it with smiles, and with soft deceitful wiles." Carl laughed again before continuing. "And it grew both day and night, till it bore an apple bright, and my foe beheld it shine, and he knew that it was mine - and into my garden stole when the night had veiled the pole; in the morning, glad, I see my foe outstretched beneath the tree."_

* * *

Gabriel snapped awake, regretting doing so immediately after his eyes opened. His whole body was shaking uncontrollably. Cold sweat dripped from every inch of his body and he could not stop shivering no matter what.

He was covered with something soft and thick, that blocked out the sunlight wonderfully and kept him blissfully free of the burning light that threatened him. It was a small comfort when he considered the agony the rest of his body was in. Each of his arms were slung over the shoulders of two people walking side by side, and neither seemed to notice that he had regained consciousness.

"I do not like this idea," the one on the left said. The voice was female and she spoke in Croatian. "Taking him in leaves us vulnerable to her attack."

"We have our orders," the one on the right replied. "Vulnerable or not, we don't have a choice."

"They've chosen a bad time to depend upon us."

"Don't be saying things like that. Whatever time they choose to call upon our hospitality, we will be ready to accept."

The daughter didn't seem convinced. She groaned and changed the subject. "Jesus, he's heavy."

"Watch your language, young lady."

"Well he is."

They stopped a moment, adjusting the hold they had on his limbs. The one on the left spoke again with a small groan. "He's not doing too well. The change is coming on too quickly now."

"He's special this one. Stronger than the others. Maybe she felt like she had to break him before she took him."

"She's never done that before," the daughter said. "But I can imagine why this one would be so special."

_Why?_

"Let's get him inside then. Block up all the windows before I take off the cloak."

"Yes mother," the daughter said.

Gabriel wanted to listen more, but darkness consumed him before they could speak again.

* * *

"Right," Carl said loudly, "So the plan is that we're going to try and find Van Helsing in hundreds upon hundreds of miles of trees and forest?"

Mina didn't have an answer to that. She suddenly felt like the decision to ride after Gabriel was too impulsive. Nearly half a day had passed and she and Carl were surrounded by trees of all shapes and sizes and there was no sign of clearing any time soon. Carl's commentary wasn't helping. Every now and then he'd scoff and say, "Oh, look, more trees."

"You're awfully quiet over there."

"What was that?" Mina snapped back into reality.

"What's the plan?" Carl asked, expecting her to revise their less than adequate idea. "You can't expect me to believe that all you have for an idea is simply to ride up to Cachtice, knock on the door with a cheerful, 'Hello! I'm here to kill you!"

Her throat went dry. She was usually the one who scolded Gabriel for being so vague. And now she was being equally as irritating, her plan so filled with holes it was unbelievable. What happened between there and Cachtice? Gabriel would be a thrall by then anyways. Perhaps he would show up and try to kill them.

_NO! That's not going to happen. She won't lay a finger on Gabriel Van Helsing or so help me I'll…_

"I don't know, Carl," she said. "We'll cross those bridges when we come to them."

She stopped suddenly, her ears picking up the sounds of a snapping branch. It was different though, not the hollow sound made by the horse's hoof as it struck the ground. It was a solid sound, made by a human foot, probably a size nine or ten boot with soft soles but a heavy heel. _There's a weapon in it._ _And he's tall, probably six feet, a hundred and eighty…_

Her eyes narrowed. Immediately her mind was calculating things that would be impossible for any human. She could hear Carl's heartbeat, pounding under his robes as he too came to a stop a few feet in front of her.

"What is it?" He asked. Mina raised a finger to her lips and drew her bow from her back, pulling the string from one end to another. She pulled the hat from her head and dismounted.

"Stay here," she said, holding up a hand to keep him on horseback. She handed him the lead rope and wandered off, following instincts she never knew she had. Somehow everything seemed so clear. The world was like she had opened her eyes for the first time. It burned in her vision, intense, so full of life. Mina strung her bow before loading, drawing the arrow back a few inches to test the weight. It was lighter than she remembered, but the thought disappeared as the sound of footsteps filled her ears again.

Mina stepped forward, glancing around hurriedly but intently. It was different now. Never before had her human instincts yielded to her vampire ones. They always lay dormant, hidden underneath her mortal intuition. It was as if they had come back to life.

Someone yelped behind her as a heavy, robed object hit the ground. Mina sighed, turning slowly to find Carl on the ground, fighting with his clothing, attempting to free himself from the thick layers of fabric that constricted his movements.

"You could have just stayed still," she said, relaxing her arm a moment. Carl got to his feet and rushed over to her, still fumbling with a weapon.

"Do you know what happens whenever I'm told to stay by myself?" he asked her rhetorically. Mina didn't want to know. She pulled the arrow back on the string before pressing onward. Carl staggered behind her, prepared with a knife and a stake. "This isn't a good idea."

"Relax Carl," she replied nonchalantly, still sniffing the wind. The footsteps were moving closer, spiraling inevitably towards them. She spun around to Carl's right.

"What was that?" he demanded at the sound of a snapping branch. Mina closed her eyes._Hundred and eighty pounds, nimble…someone who works out. Healthy heart…oh God, his veins…_

"What was that?"

"What was what?"

"That last bit…" Carl said fearfully. Mina glanced over at him, watching as the colour drained away from his face. She reached for her face immediately, embarrassed, as she realized that her fangs had grown without her command. She turned back and took a deep breath, trying to will them back into place. _Come on, _she thought to herself, _come on, come on…_

The footsteps returned.

"DOMINICK! IT'S COMING!" Mina looked up just in time to see the silver shape move swiftly though the trees. Without another thought for her 'other half' she loaded her bow and fired, striking with surprising accuracy. The wolf roared, arching its back painfully before turning and glaring at Mina and Carl.

A wad of bloody saliva dripped out from between its lips as it shook the arrow from its thick skin. Mina held out her hand to Carl for him to hand her some silver ammunition, but he wasn't looking at her hand. He was staring wide-eyed and pale-skinned at the beast that seemed to give them a look of pure hunger, like it hadn't eaten in weeks.

"It would be a good time for someone to say run," he said shakily.

Mina exhaled heavily. Her mouth went dry as the creature's heartbeat filled her ears. She imagined it on the ground, writhing in agony as she clamped her jaws on its throat.

"Well if you won't…" Carl turned right around and took off in the other direction.

The wolf licked its lips and took off towards him.

Mina couldn't move for a moment, frozen in thought. _You can stop him Mina. Think about stopping him. Think about the shape. Think about the power. Think about it hard._

"ARE YOU COMING?!" She finally tore herself from the voice in her head and ran after him.

"CARL! GIVE ME SOME SILVER BULLETS!"

"It's a little hard to do that when you're several feet behind me!" Carl shouted back, dodging another tree. Mina widened her steps a little more, still used to walking in the thick crinoline skirts of her corseted gowns. The pants allowed her to run freely, and the discovery that her legs were longer than she thought came at the most opportune moment, since a second later the giant paw of the wolf swiped across her back. The claws caught on the fabric but missed her skin by millimeters. Thinking quickly, Mina dropped to the ground. The wolf jumped over top of her, but did not stop. It kept moving for Carl.

The friar was slower than Mina. His own wardrobe did not allow the freedoms hers did. He looked over his shoulder, finding Mina nowhere in sight, but the wolf close behind. So close he could hear the growls from its throat, the heavy breathing, the smell of rotting meat…

"HEY!" The wolf dropped down onto its front legs, looking over it's own shoulder now.

SNAP! The sound of a bowstring being released was the last thing it ever heard.

"Why don't you pick on someone your own size?" Mina asked, loading another arrow into the bow.

The wolf charged towards her this time, the arrow hanging from its neck, shaking wildly with every step.

"Carl…" she said, firing again. The friar did not miss a beat. Already he had a revolver loaded with silver bullets and had started to fire.

A little too lat however, since the wolf hurled itself into Mina and dropped to the ground. And then the ground dropped beneath them, and the cage holding the two rose into the sky, near the treetops.

"GOT IT DOMINICK!" A voice shouted. "Along with something else."

* * *

Author's Notes: I've been having some ongoing problems with e-mails and attachments. It won't even let me send large letters. So Grissom, if you're reading this, instead of writing to you paragraph by paragraph, I'll just post and hope to God the problem is fixed in time for the next chapter. And even if you don't read this I'll e-mail you with the small letter of notice. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have several death threats to send to Hotmail.

However, before I leave, I would like to respond to my reviews. Not one on one, directly (I'm a little busy at the moment, I apologize) but I would like to write just a few.

1) I am trying to make Mina's character less 2 dimensional. In a response to Eccentricat's review I went back and re-read a lot of my original chapters and realized nothing had gone according to plan. I didn't want to push the romance between her and Van Helsing in fear of scrutiny, since I really hate Mary-Sues and the thought of my characters becoming them. Unfortunately in my crusade to stop Mina from being a two-dimensional character I actually succeeded in transforming her into one.

2) Carl will have a much large role. Because I've broken the story down into two parts really (Van Helsing's story and Carl and Mina's) he'll be having a bigger part to play than in the first. And no, I have no intention of turning Carl into a thrall. Not even becoming a vampire could make David Wenham any sexier.

3) The wolf in the forest is not a werewolf. If it were, I would have clearly expressed the factor of it being night. But it's not, so more on that in the next chapter.

4) Looks like a lot of people are rooting for a Mina/Elizabeth fight scene. Hmm…put them both in the mud in Dracula's Brides' costumes and you have a pay-per-view event on yours hands.

5) The Vampire Hierarchy I have created for the story was of my own design. I apologize if it looks like I was inspired from another source. Basically, it was a mixture of Quizilla and The Ninth Gate that gave me the idea. I am still attempting to work in the character description I was given last chapter. My biggest problem was the inconsistencies with the vampire archetype already established by Sommers. If the Vampire elder were to have a half-human child, the baby would never grow from its infantile state. Also, it would possess both human features and vampire ones, making for a rather ugly creature in my opinion, one that probably lacked significant intelligent thought the creature who would cure Van Helsing would need to possess. The female would have to have submitted herself entirely into darkness to attain the status of Incubus before breaking free from that, leaving no connection between her and the elders. Check back next chapter for my final interpretation.

6) Also next chapter: Vaseria. Who took over in the wake of Anna's death? Gabriel Van Helsing: Ow, that's going to leave a mark. Want me to kiss it better? Carl: Poor guy. Just when he gets armed he becomes not-so-dangerous. Mina: You better put a leash on your man or he is always going to get away. Elizabeth: Making her blood bath built for two. How…romantic? Weird Male Vampire Who Knows Mina: Become less miscellaneous dude. Maybe check in on her while she's bathing. Oops! Was that just a spoiler? Mother and Daughter Duo: Beloved saviours of Van Helsing. I have a whole bunch of Van-Fans who'll kill you if you don't make everything all better. Maybe you should find yourself a fairy godmother. Quick! Make a princess cry! Cardinal Jinette: You can't die! You're the one villain Van Helsing can't kill, or doesn't want to kill, or maybe just can't…I'm not sure. I can't discuss the psychological connection between the crazy-old-dude-mentor archetype Jinette and the rebellious-angry-amnesiac Van Helsing.

7) Oh yeah, and there was a review a while back regarding Peta Wilson, and I have to say I agree. I've changed my mind officially. I've started modelling her after Rachel Weisz. Any other suggestions for cast members?

Well, there's my lengthily author's note. Hope I answered all the important questions. If not, just review again and I'll get to them next chapter. Sorry I didn't do individual review responses!

Well, time to get back to my unnaturally long English Exam. (Gives evil glare in general direction of English teacher) SEE YOU NEXT CHAPTER!


	11. Cages, Wolves, Smoke, and Fog

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts in this story pertaining to Van Helsing are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur writing effort. It is for entertainment purposes only.

* * *

Chapter 11: Cages, Wolves, Smoke, and Fog

_There was a golden rule, one rule that he was never meant to break. He was to never interfere, under any circumstances, unless ordered to. Everything that happened was meant to happen, and his decisions based on mortal morality were not helping at all. Gabriel wished they would pay attention to his propositions once in a while, but his superior ruled with an iron fist, and he knew better than to question him._

_But there was a lingering feeling of danger that haunted him. He watched over the house, day and night, watching over the two occupants inside. The lights were on well into the night so it was easy to observe them. He would watch them through the windows, their eyes impassioned by their work. It was something about them that fascinated him, that kept him focused, that kept him coming back over and over again._

_It sounded creepy, but he loved watching them. He loved seeing them together, seeing them apart, seeing them in general. It was nice to see her walking down a quiet street in her large dresses, wide rimmed hats, with a smile on her face as she spoke with friends and shopped in the large stores. It was comforting to see him in his study, searching through books with his tie hanging loosely around his throat as he read and re-read papers from clients. It gave him a feeling of normalcy, something his superior could not._

_"Eventually you are going to have to accept the two different worlds, Gabriel," his superior said, coming up behind Gabriel. The two stood on a rooftop over London, looking down into the street where the two were walking arm-in-arm. "And you are going to have to come to terms with the fact that you can only exist in one."_

_"It's boring that way," he replied, "to exist in one world. I can't stand the thought of becoming someone as anal retentive as you."_

_His superior laughed lightly. Gabriel did as well, smiling into the night. _

_"Life just doesn't hold the same meaning for me anymore, not like it once did." Gabriel shrugged a little. "A long time ago it was so much more invigorating. The thrill of the hunt…the smell of the forest…" He closed his eyes in reflection, thinking back to the good old days. "It was so much more enjoyable than sitting here in wait, just praying that tomorrow the sky falls so you have something to do."_

_The man shrugged. "Perhaps. But that's only if you look at in terms of atheism. A life of God always has purpose, Gabriel. Every second is necessary for a great plan He decides upon." _

_"In that world," Gabriel pointed to the people beneath him, walking through the bustling streets. "In that world everything matters. A man on the street has a purpose in that world. But we don't. We are 'observers', we are guardians, but we do not have a purpose in their world."_

_"How can you say that?" the man asked surprised. His eyes narrowed but his face didn't wrinkle. "How can you say that we hold no purpose in those lives? Open your eyes and look at them, Gabriel. Watch them carefully, those two people who you are so deeply interested in. Look at where they are walking, Gabriel, look at where they are all walking." Gabriel followed them with his eyes, and they lead him directly to the Church two blocks over. He rolled his eyes at the point the man was trying to make. His superior walked to Gabriel's side and stared straight ahead. "We have a purpose in their lives, just as everything does. We are to be their shadows, Gabriel, nothing more. Merely the air they breathe and the water they drink, the earth they walk upon, the sky they stare at…we are the comfort when they cry, the cure for their fears…and while you scoff about having no purpose down there, those people cling to the thought of you. That is our purpose Gabriel. That is our reason for existence. Down there, in the hearts and minds of those people exists our divine purpose."_

_"You were a priest while you were alive, weren't you?" Gabriel said with a smile. His superior glanced at him and smiled as well. "Hell, I would have become Catholic with that speech."_

_The dream yielded to storm clouds, as the face of his superior faded off into the distance. Gabriel felt the rain tumble over his skin and through his hair, cascading over his body as his wings flapped powerfully against the strengthening winds. The shadowed figure flew towards him once more. _

_"Here we go again," Gabriel said with a roll of his eyes, just as the conversation and battle took place again. His wings snapped in half and pain consumed him from the toes all the way to his head, and suddenly he was falling through the storm clouds to the ground below._

_White light spread through his vision as fresh snow tumbled blindingly around him. Mina's body appeared out of the fog, as she screamed his name desperately against the whistling winds._

_And then there was darkness: soundless, sightless, and painless._

* * *

Mina pushed her bow into the wolf's mouth as her only line of defense. She propped her back against the bars of the cage and hooked her heeled boots onto the bow to keep the wolf at bay. It bit down hard on the aging wood, splintering it within its jaws. She pressed harder against the giant wolf, knowing the bow would break any second and there would be nothing between her and the beast's mouth. 

And she knew the stories of vampires who had been bitten by werewolves. No amount of Excalibur would save her from that fate.

"There's a man up there inside with it!" The voices down below were calling back and forth to one another, loud enough to be heard over the cocking of rifles and pistols as they prepared to fire. Mina groaned. _Would someone shoot this damn thing and fast!_ She pushed herself upwards towards the top of the cage and gripped the bars, fumbling with the heavy hook that suspended it in the air. There was nothing else to do but wait and hope that someone decided to pull the trigger.

The bow snapped in three parts, quickly tumbling to the bottom of the cage. Mina gripped the walls on her prison, staring directly at the beast that would be the death of her. It growled and seemed to smile at the sight of her, craving the taste of her flesh more than anything else in the world. She shivered at the thought of being consumed and concentrated only on the anger that came with the idea.

"I will not die here," she vowed silently to herself. "Not in a cage."

The wolf pounced just as Mina started to transform. It started at her legs, moving up from her boots to her thighs. Her toes lengthened into claws, white as marble with blue and purple veins running up her legs. When the wolf reached her body her stronger legs forced him back, throwing him against the opposite wall of the cage, knocking it senseless for a moment.

Bullets started firing from below, waking Mina from her trance. Her legs reverted back into their normal form, but she was left shaking and shivering from the other side of the wolf's body.

She had never transformed into one of those creatures. Her body had always become bats, and only when she commanded it to. She had lost control a moment ago, enough to have been completely-if not temporarily-consumed by the darkness that flowed through her veins.

The wolf suddenly came back to his senses. It threw itself onto its hind legs just as a bullet flew into the ropes holding the cage in the treetops. Mina felt it lurch in the direction of the wolf just as it started to fall, and she had to grip onto the wall to avoid being eaten alive. Her body moved upwards as the wolf clawed its way in her direction, climbing up the steeping wall to see the ground coming closer with every passing second.

Mina closed her eyes and braced for impact.

* * *

Carl was very proud of himself. He had fired a gun and actually hit something. It made him smile. It made him feel special. 

Until he realized he had hit the rope holding the cage up into the tree.

It was hard to tell this of course, since the whole event happened so quickly he wasn't sure if it was his bullet or another that had actually caused the rope to snap. But after a brief calculation of his position and the size of bullet he had been using, he realized that it must have been him. And though the thought of actually hitting something was gratifying to the friar (who had been told by the 'almighty king of shooting' Gabriel Van Helsing that he wouldn't be able to hit an elephant if was standing in front of him), he couldn't help but become very worried about the state Mina Harker would be in once she emerged from the cage.

Cursing, Carl ran towards the falling cage, finding himself lost within a crowd of men. They were all shouting, pointing, running around frantically trying to find something to do. The friar squinted at the shape within the cage, the one he thought was Mina (although it was hard to see because of the giant mound of fur and teeth that lay beneath her in a heap) and just prayed for an answer. _Must…do…anything! _

Impact…

* * *

_Carl had a habit of surprising him. He would always come up with a weapon that was absolutely perfect for his needs. There was the gas powered crossbow for Dracula's brides, the silver bullets for the thousands of werewolves he had killed throughout the ages, the sword for Morgan le Fey…_

_Carl had a weapon for every occasion, just as Gabriel Van Helsing did._

_His first hunt was in Italy, not far outside Rome. The landscape was dotted with vineyards and farms for as far as the eye could see, and did not relent until he reached another bustling port or town filled with growing industry and churches. Nighttimes were absolutely beautiful in Italy as well, especially when there were no more buildings to obstruct your view, no more steeples to block out the moon and the stars from viewing. _

_Gabriel felt alive when he was outside the city walls. He felt like a fraction of his former self, or at least he thought he did. He wasn't entirely sure if the happiness that spread throughout his entire body was from a past life or from being away from the Vatican. Either way, he was content on those dusty roads that crisscrossed between properties, happier than he could ever remember being in his entire life._

_The first mission was werewolves, of course. They ran rampant throughout the wilderness at sunset, as long as the full moon was visible in the sky. _

_The hunter stopped short at a crossroads, pulling his pistol out from his jacket. He was focused entirely, embracing his instincts as he attempted to track down the wolf. _

_"Come out, come out, wherever you are…" he chanted under his breath, willing the animal to come out of hiding. He cocked his pistol, looking around quickly to avoid missing anything. A single movement could lead him in the right direction, or so his instincts told him. Of course, they were instincts. He couldn't trust his conscious mind right now, considering the fact that he had yet to retrieve a single memory since waking up in the Vatican._

_He wanted out of God's eyes, but he couldn't explain why. _

_A long howl rang out from behind him as the animal charged. Gabriel whipped around on horseback, firing expertly. The four or five rounds her fired hit their mark, causing the beast to catch flame and explode before it could land on him._

_So it began…_

* * *

Gabriel felt like he was floating. He could smell thick smoke whether he was conscious or unconscious, a fact that made his throat and nostrils burn even more. He choked on his saliva, sending him into a coughing fit temporarily, one that was abated by the feeling of cold water being poured down his throat. 

He could hear voices above him. Once again, his instincts took hold. There were three women: one sitting and two standing, each of them nearby. The only gentlemen spoke seldom, but when he did the whole world fell silent to his words. _Words that I can't make out, _he thought, straining to clear his senses enough to listen in.

One of the women left the room, and by the sounds of her footsteps, she was angry, probably forced out of the conversation by the stern sounded gentleman and even stricter sounding lady. The other woman stammered, but stopped short mid-sentence. She was worried about something, but what could she possibly be worried about?

_The fact that you have a centuries-old vampire elder chasing you might be a good reason._ He squinted, finally realizing what Carl meant when he said that his sarcasm was inappropriate. His mind laughed, replying with a quick, _it's not sarcasm. It's truth._

_God damn it I'm outsmarting myself, _Gabriel thought angrily. He tried to open his eyes again but found that they were too heavy, as if someone had tied them shut. Every time he tried to move he found an overstuffed pillow in his path, probably to keep him immobile and still for the healing process. Gabriel groaned quickly. He hated the healing process. Carl had once told him that Gabriel hadn't the faintest idea of how to recover correctly. By the time Gabriel could ask Carl what he meant, he discovered that the friar had drugged him. Carl paid dearly for his moment of fun however, when he came down with a case of the flu that left his bedridden for a week. Every chance Gabriel got he slipped something into Carl's food. The poor friar could barely go ten seconds without passing out again from some of his own potions. When he did get better Gabriel told him it was getting a taste of his own medicine. Carl burned the hunter's eyebrows off 'accidentally' the next time they were alone together.

The door open and shut as the man and woman left, dismissing themselves politely enough. The woman walked back to the bedrooms and had a few words with 'Angry Girl'. A door slammed. The conversation was obviously over.

Gabriel sighed deeply as the darkness consumed him once more.

* * *

"Ow…" 

"She's awake."

Mina blinked. The dim sunlight flooded into her eyes as she attempted to regain to clarity. Everything was blurry, dancing around in brightly coloured shapes amidst the trees. The cold breeze made her shiver, even through she was fairly sure she was wrapped in layers and layers of blankets.

"You're either the bravest woman I've ever met in my life," someone began, just above her. Mina managed to catch sight of black curls before she had to close her eyes again. "Or the craziest."

_Laughter. Oh, leave me alone. God, my head hurts. _

"Mina?" Carl asked. She knew that voice at least. It was the soft and sometimes pathetic one. The one that made her smile even though she was still regretting ever waking up. She finally sat up slowly, gripping her head with every inch that she moved.

"What the hell happened?" She asked; her voice was quiet.

"Well that answers my question! She's British: crazy and brave." More laughing. Mina hissed and looked at Carl who was hunched over beside her.

"I may have shot the rope holding up the cage," he said guiltily, but then became impassioned in an attempt to defend himself. "But it killed the werewolf!"

"Wonderful," she said, getting back to her feet. The coat that had been wrapped around her wasn't hers. It was leather and fur lined; something that one of the gentlemen around her wore. Feeling as if she were betraying her current lover, she peeled the coat off her.

"Wouldn't do that," a man said, pulling it back over her shoulders. "Temperature's dropping and you took a nasty knock on the head. Better keep that on a little while longer." He walked around in front of her, inspecting her with an intense gaze. Mina felt naked suddenly and shied away, crossing her arms over her dress shirt and coat. The man smiled, bemused by her appearance. He was tall and thin, muscular from what Mina could tell. His body was toned by hunting probably, the most likely activity for him to partake in that far out from civilization. His hair was short and hung in tight ringlets close to his scalp and he had the makings of a beard of his chin, the sort of stubble one got from a day or two of not shaving. _They must have been out here for a while, _Mina thought, but said nothing. She was too distracted by his hazel eyes, the ones that bore into her own so deep she felt like he could see her soul.

One of the men said something in Transylvanian. The smiling man nodded and replied, just as quickly. Mina looked at Carl for help, but he just shrugged, inching closer to her. The men moved towards their horses and started saddling up.

"Forgive me," the smiling man said. "I am Dominick Matyas." He bowed deeply, rising before continuing. "And who might you be?"

There was no use in lying. "Mina Harker," she said. Dominick smiled and took up her hand, placing a small kiss on it. She took it away quickly, shakily, unsure of how to react. Dominick didn't seem offended at all. He backed off immediately, turning towards the friar.

"And who's your small companion?"

Carl looked up at the gentleman. "I'm not small."

"Pardon than sir," Dominick said, trying not to laugh. "You're name?"

Carl still looked offended. Mina answered for him. "This is Carl."

"Carl," he said with a nod. "It is a pleasure to meet you both. I never expected to go on a hunt and come back with such a lovely prize."

Mina blushed again. She had never received so many compliments before in one conversation. And Gabriel did call her beautiful. He just never said it so…so...

_Poetically?_ She found herself inarticulate with Dominick's hazel eyes boring into her flesh. He couldn't tell could he? Did the pale skin give away her secret? Did her fierce eyes and flush cheeks tell of the evil inside her she dare not speak of? She prayed that it didn't. Staring at her with those wild, impassioned eyes was one thing. Staring at her because she was a vampire was a completely different matter.

"Storm's brewing, little brother," another man said, dragging forward several horses from the thicket of trees. "We better get going. As should you." He looked directly at Carl and Mina when he spoke.

"Heading in our direction?" Dominick asked.

"Depends on which way your direction is." Mina spoke eloquently. She prayed that they would keep as far away from Dominick Matyas as possible.

"Vaseria," his brother said. "And you better consider changing your plans. Snow storms hit hard and fast here. Our weather mimics our beasts." He mounted a horse and looked down at both Mina and Carl. "Besides, a young woman and a friar wouldn't want to be lost in a Transylvanian forest at night."

"You think I can't defend myself?" Mina asked him, eyes narrowing. The man on the horse shook his head. He was taller than Dominick with longer curls that came down past his ears. He had the same intense eyes and more of a beard as well.

"I never said that," he replied, offering a horse to Dominick. "From the little stunt you pulled today I know you can defend yourself. Not many women would be able to survive being locked in a cage with a balverine. But there are other dangers in this forest to look out for." The wind howled. Carl shivered. The brother smiled cruelly.

"The Countess hunts tonight."

"The Countess doesn't scare me," Mina said. Dominick grinned.

"British women," his brother said, rolling his eyes, "More crazy than courageous. Come with us to Vaseria tonight, and we will see how you fair against the countess."

Mina smiled coolly, an expression she rarely used. "Transylvanian men. Their bark is worse than their bite."

She walked off into the forest to fetch the horses.

_It feels good to get the last word._


	12. Solitude

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts pertaining to the movie Van Helsing in this story are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur writing effort. There was no money made off the posting of this story.

* * *

Chapter 12: Solitude

The glass of blood tumbled from the table and struck the ground, shattering immediately. The red liquid flew out in all angles, splashing against the walls and the skirt of her dress.

"You're angry then?"

Elizabeth let out a cry, so loud and so furious that all her thralls were sent into shivers. They curled away from her, gathering in the shadows of her dining hall, watching their mistress in fear. She raised her hands in the air, the human flesh fading to her vampire form. She finally silenced, dropping her arms back to her sides, returning to her mortal state.

Grigori smiled coolly, leaping off the table. The Countess looked furious. She had been dressed nicely for the arrival of her new thrall, her gown crimson and black, adorned with blood coloured jewels. But once he had let the secret slip the mood changed, and Elizabeth went berserk.

It was just the reaction he had hoped for.

"How could you let this happen? After all that we have worked for, you allow this to happen."

He laughed loudly. The thralls growled at him from the separate corners of the room but did not dare move without Her permission. Grigori looked back at the countess.

"I took an oath, my lovely Countess," he said, taking up a glass of blood from the table and sipping it lightly. "I am not to interfere, not even in this body."

"You call yourself a vampire…"

"No," he said, stopping her. He set the glass back down on the table. "We had a deal. I did my part. I got you into the Order. Now, I'm just taking care of my loose end. It's your job to deal with the hunter, not me."

"You were told to make sure those two didn't get in the way!" She shouted. The thralls hissed again in agreement. "You knew the threat they posed. You knew they alone possessed the cure!"

"Oh, gee, must have slipped my mind."

Elizabeth charged, and with a crack and a gush of wind she had the man pinned against the wall. Her fingernails dug into his throat, causing long streams of black blood to drip down the front of his tunic. He gasped slightly.

"This is not a game, Grigori," she said, quieter than before, but stern nonetheless. "Without Gabriel, everything we have worked for in the past years will mean nothing. You saw what he did to Dracula. Unless he stands by my side it won't matter if I have the Holy Order under my control. We will still fail!"

Grigori remained ever defiant, reaching upwards and grabbing her wrist strongly. He yanked her hand from his swiftly, throwing it back in her face before wiping the black blood away from his neck.

"Never forget who you're speaking to," he told her, pointing a threatening finger near her precious face. "Gabriel Van Helsing is your problem, not mine. It's your fault he was found by Francis and that damn daughter of hers. I have my own intentions, as I have always had. And I will not begin to believe that any of this is my fault." Elizabeth growled, her fangs growing. Grigori sneered and shot closer to her, stopping just inches from her face. "Don't even think of threatening me woman. I fear very few people in this world, and you are not one of them." He straightened his tunic. "Now, if you need someone to blame, fetch a servant girl. I'll be in the chamber." Grigori walked off towards the door. Elizabeth growled at him behind his back.

He stopped short at the door. "By the way, Countess, don't even think of interrupting me." He looked over his shoulder, red eyes blazing as his jet black hair danced wildly around his face. Elizabeth glared at him. "I'll tell father."

Grigori smiled and walked out of the room.

Elizabeth screamed. She threw dishes from the table against the walls of the room. The china shattered and cut the faces of her whimpering thralls, each crying for their mistress's pain. She stormed out of the room to the balcony, the wind catching her long lengths of black hair and tossing them about carelessly.

Night had fallen. The moon was full in the sky, shining down on top of her. She could hear the werewolves howling on the parapets above her, anxious for the night's hunt. She sneered cruelly, wondering how she could punish the hunter. She dreamed wicked thoughts and finally came to a conclusion, but not the one she expected.

It would be too easy to fly to Rome and unleash the holy terror of newly made thralls. And Van Helsing would never hear of that until he returned. Besides, holding them just made them hungrier, and they would be even more of a delight to watch.

So she snapped her fingers and called her balverines to her. They were larger, more ferocious than their werewolf cousins, and unlike their close relatives, they did not require the moon for the curse to take hold. They remained wolves their entire lives.

All four leapt from the tower, crawling down the walls of her castle. Elizabeth smiled and closed her eyes, calling out over the land for Gabriel's mind. When she found it she had only one thing to tell him before he was lost to her forever.

_Innocent blood spills tonight Gabriel. Your friar and lover will be lost to you by morning._

* * *

Gabriel snapped awake and immediately regretted doing so. A wave of nausea passed over him, causing him to lurch forward and nearly vomit. He swallowed back the sensation, however, upon instinct. Of course, everything in his current state was instinct driven. Whenever his conscious mind was too drugged to comprehend things, his instincts were in control, driving him into insanity as he tried to piece together what everything meant. 

He had stopped in recent years. The constant calculating and formulating of memories drove him insane from all the times he did it. But now his instincts were moving faster than ever, something that was new to him. As Elizabeth's venom had taken over he had lost them, wondering if their speed would ever return. It had, and he was left reeling from all the information he processed within a matter of minutes.

First, he was on the floor, lying on his stomach and entangled in bed sheets, comforters, and pillows he assumed were there to prevent him from moving around too much. The way they were arranged told him they had once been tucked tightly around his body. But Gabriel couldn't stand being smothered by things. Even at the Order he kicked his blankets practically off the bed when he slept, when he was allowed to sleep in the Order.

Second, he didn't know where he was or how he got there. The last memory was of Elizabeth in the forest, and then darkness consumed him. The house was furnished in such a manner that the décor betrayed the look of the aging wood it was built from. Gabriel found he was surrounded by tapestries and shelves filled with amulets and trinkets from days and battles past. A set of broad swords hung over the fireplace, glistening from the flames that crackled within. Daggers filled the opposite walls, along with bows and quivers filled with beautiful arrows made of mahogany and hawk feathers. Pistols and rifles filled the racks along the walls. Gabriel swallowed hard and felt comforted a little. On the one hand he knew how to use all of the weapons. On the other hand, the residents probably knew how to use them as well.

"Oh my gosh!" A woman's voice filled his ears. Gabriel turned his head again and found a petite girl standing in the doorway. She was dressed in heavy furs from head to foot, her hair disheveled from whatever she had been doing outside. She set her pistol down near the door. "MOTHER! HE'S AWAKE!"  
The hunter's ears were ringing. The girl's eyes traveled over his body suddenly. Gabriel felt naked suddenly, and looked down under the blankets.

He was naked.

Nervously, he pulled the blankets up around his body a little more.

"I never would have believed it," she said, still astounded by him as she stepped forward. "Do those hurt? The scars on your back? Do they hurt?"

"Goodness girl, leave the man alone." He mother came inside, dropping down the newly killed animals and her pistol by the door. "He probably just woke up. How are you feeling?"  
Gabriel found that he couldn't answer. He finally found his voice. "Where are my clothes?"  
"I washed them," the smaller girl announced proudly. "Then fixed them. You had some nasty holes in them. But they smelled like perfume. Do you have a sweetheart?"

The mother laughed heartily and pulled off the heavy furs she wore as a jacket before depositing them down onto the chair. Underneath she was a willowy woman, tall and muscular, built from life in the forest. Her hair was a dusty blonde coloured, knotted into dread locks, and her eyes were pale blue.

"Darling, give him some time to breathe," she said. "I apologize for my daughter. We don't get a lot of visitors out here."

"Where is here?" He asked, pulling the blankets around him tighter as he sat up. His neck was still stiff. He reached up to his throat and found a poultice wrapped tightly around where Elizabeth had bitten him. He jerked back. "Sorry. You were in quite a state when we brought you here. I was wondering if there was anything we could do to get you out of the woods, so to speak." She knelt next to him and started pulling at the bandages. Gabriel inched backwards from her, unsure of her and her daughter. His instincts were taking hold again. _It's night,_ he thought, glancing out the door. When Elizabeth visited him it had been noon. How many hours had it been? How long had he been here?

"Who are you?" he asked, pulling away from her at last. The woman sighed deeply.

"I'm Francis," she said, placing a hand on her chest. "That's Lillith." Her daughter waved as she undressed, revealing the same type of willowy figure as her mother, the same blonde hair and icy blue eyes. "We honestly don't mean you any harm. We're just trying to help. And I can help much better by changing that bandage."

Gabriel's muscles were still tensed. He was in a room full of weapons but ideas eluded him. His conscious mind was telling him to stand and fight. His instincts were telling him otherwise. _You're naked,_ they said. _I don't know how threatening you are without clothes._

He finally relaxed, still on guard enough to calculate his distance from each of the weapons in the room. He could reach for a dagger first and still have a chance to hide his bottom half with a sheet before attacking.

_Gabriel, for Christ's sake, they're not going to attack you._

"Do they hurt?" Gabriel turned his head, wincing in pain as his neck throbbed. Francis yanked the rest of the bandages from his neck. Lillith pressed a hand against the triangular scar on his back.

"Alright, I'm finished," Gabriel said, pulling up a sheet around his legs as he jumped off the floor. "I want my clothes and my weapons and I want out of here."

"I have to apologize for my daughter," Francis said, standing up. "Lillith get dinner ready. Please, sit back down, I promise we're finished."

Gabriel was still uneasy, fumbling with the bed sheet to wrap himself inside it so no one got a good look at him. He fumbled with the space behind him, trying to find a weapon so he could arm himself. "Where am I?"

"Transylvania," she said quickly, not wanting to annoy him further. Francis still stood back a few feet from him. "Near the Caspian Mountains."

"And who are you two? Why do you live so far away from any civilization?"

Francis was silent, unable to say anything. Gabriel gripped a dagger from the wall cautiously, keeping it within his firm grip before she could answer. The mother finally sighed, looking at her daughter before back at the hunter. "Reasons I cannot state."

"Very well," Gabriel said, taking the dagger from the wall and walking towards the door. Lillith shot a warning glance at her mother, running after him.

"You can't leave!" She shouted from the porch. The hunter stopped short in what would be the front yard. He was surrounded by forest in all directions, alone except for the animals that wandered around at night. The moon was full in the sky, shining brightly upon the hunter and the younger woman.

He took a few deep breaths of the cold air, feeling the winds pick up swiftly. He wanted Mina's bed and her body next to his, her hands running up his back, kissing his flesh tenderly, whispering sweet intelligent nothings in his ear as they fell asleep together. He wanted to feel whole again, not as alone as he felt in the forest with the trees closing in around him, threatening to crush the life from him.

He felt like he had just woken up at the Vatican. Any second now the gargoyles would fly out from the sky and attempt to murder him. Only this time he didn't have any tojo blades to defend himself. He was alone and unarmed in the world, standing naked in front of an army he couldn't kill.

"You can't leave," Lillith said again, coming closer. "She's still got a hold on you. She's still watching you. And if you leave now she'll come after you again."  
"Than what am I to do?" He asked, turning to face her. "Stay here for another night? I have people out there, friends I have to help."

She fell silent, lowering her head behind a layer of her blonde hair. She looked almost ghostly in the moonlight, her pale skin, her icy cold eyes…

"I keep seeing things, things I can't stop thinking about. And if I don't leave now people I care about could die." He looked back out to the forests, finding the clouds on the horizon. _Snow,_ his body went rigid. _Snow meant Mina and Carl were dying._

"She's showing you what's going to happen," Lillith said. "But prophecies only reflect a choice. A choice you're going to make."

"And how do I stop making that choice?" He asked. "How do I stop something I don't know that I'm going to do?"

"You could start with coming inside and getting your clothes back?" She suggested.

Gabriel looked back to the forest a moment. He sighed deeply and turned his back on the young girl, embracing the wildlife again. Far off in the distance a wolf howled, crying out for his pack. They found him again, calling back with the same long whine as the first. He closed his eyes, heard the pounding of the blood in his ears and finally embraced his weakness as the weight of his limbs started to pull him into the earth itself and swallow him up.

"How did it happen?" He asked her suddenly, out of the blue. "How did you cure me?"  
Silence. Gabriel turned slightly, looking just over his shoulder. Lillith smiled back at him, crossing her arms and suppressing a shiver.

"Let's go back inside? It's cold."

"How was it done?" He asked her again, grabbing the sheath from the dagger threateningly. _Oh come on Gabriel. You wouldn't actually kill her. _

_No, _he thought, _but there's no harm in scaring her._

He whipped around again and found the girl was gone. The moonlight shone down over the small house as the door slammed closed, the blue illumination shimmering down upon his body. Gabriel knew what he was looking at though. He could feel it in his bones, through his veins, moving through his heart. His eyes moved to the rooftop, finding the blue robed figure staring down at him. The man smiled softly, the same smile he always had on his face.

"Hello Gabriel." He said.

The hunter sneered, glaring cruelly. The reaction was instantaneous, something that happened because it was meant to happen. Somewhere inside his body he was told to do it. This man deserved every ounce of his cruelty, his malice. Every single minute of every single day was spent being wicked to this man for some reason Gabriel couldn't remember.

The words that ushered forth from his mouth were the same way.

"Hello Michael."

* * *


	13. The Spirit of the Hunt

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts pertaining to the movie Van Helsing in this story are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amateur writing effort. This story is for entertainment purposes only.

* * *

Chapter 13: The Spirit of the Hunt

Darkness had settled over the forest by now, leaving only small patches of moonlight visible through the trees. Mina stared directly ahead of her, not wanting to look at Carl or anyone for that matter.

She felt weakened amidst this crowd of men. It was like she was screaming at the top of her lungs in a crowded room and no one was looking up at the sound of her voice. The feeling went beyond that of normal bloodlust and struck her in the heart, causing the air to come slowly from her chest.

"What is it that brings a woman and a friar into the forest late at night?" Dominick's older brother asked her, rousing her from her vigil on the trees. She had heard the men call him Vincent. Mina turned to look at him, unable to stare him straight in the eye. Her response was slow as she turned and looked back at the trail, unsure of what to say. What could she say? Lie again, like she had on the ship? Or tell the truth and be warranted for suspicion? Going to Cachtice was probably one of the last things one did in this land, regardless of whom or what had been taken there. She knew if she admitted the truth, someone would start to take a closer look at her neck.

"Vacation," she replied simply.

"You think I'm a fool don't you?" He asked her in response. "You think I'm a bloody idiot?"

"No," Mina recoiled, "I think you're interrogating someone who doesn't need to be."

"Well I think you need to be." Vincent stated quietly, not wanting to draw attention to them. Mina bit her bottom lip. "A young woman with a friar as a companion traveling into Transylvania, disguised as a man, no less, armed God knows how heavily? This sparks suspicion in me, Miss. Harker, a lot of suspicion, considering the problems we've had here before."

"You're suspicions are misplaced, sir," she said, staring straight ahead once more. She couldn't bear to look at his face any longer, the sight of his causing her to want his blood more and more. She knew it wasn't a sexual want, there was no possible way she would want Vincent Matyas like that. But the blood lust called to her, asking her to just take a sip, nothing more, nothing less.

_And I forgot my serum._

"Enlighten me, please," he said, still glaring at her.

Mina finally faced him, raising her voice a little.

"We are searching for a friend," she said quickly. "That is all you need to know. Where, who and how is our business altogether and hardly something you need to be indulged in."

"I beg your pardon, madam, but I believe it is my business. I am granting you my mercy…"

"Of which I need none," she added, but Vincent wasn't listening.

"You are coming onto my land Miss Harker, and I want to make one thing perfectly clear: if you are to try anything out of the ordinary, my brother's affections will not spare you from my sword."  
_  
He thinks he's won._

She smiled at him, a cruel smile, one with nothing but contempt behind it. "I live to serve."

Mina kicked her horse sternly and veered away from Vincent, sliding up next to Carl's pony. She bent over and whispered in his ear.

"Keep an eye out for Vincent," she said, looking back to him. His hazel eyes narrowed as his brow creased, once again a look of his suspicion. He was not a terrible looking man with a well defined jaw and chiseled body visible with his open jacket. Mina turned back to Carl. "He doesn't trust us, and I don't trust him."

"What about Dominick?" Carl asked, just as quietly. Mina rolled her eyes.

"Dominick's the kind of boy any woman could wrap around her finger," she said, shooting a look to the obviously younger brother. He was a boy, much younger than she; probably seventeen or eighteen, driven to hunt by an ambitious older brother who would forever to cast a shadow over his life. Mina felt sorry for him, but then he would show her that boyish grin and she would be filled with happiness once more, knowing that somehow, he would be alright. "A breathing woman is a good woman for Dominick. He's not going to be a bother."

"What are we going to do?" He asked her, knowing they were attracting attention. Mina turned her head a little, trying to look as if they weren't having a private conversation.

"I don't know," she replied, "but whatever it is we'll have to do it quickly, and quietly; something that won't attract attention." Mina's eyes narrowed. Was Carl laughing? She shot him a confused look as he giggled childishly. "What?" The friar nearly fell off his pony from laughter. "Carl! I demand to know what is so funny!"

"Not attract attention?" he laughed again. Eyes were starting to look their way. Mina lowered her head behind her dirty hair, hiding her face. Carl continued. "Do you actually think we're going to manage that?"

There was a beat. The friar grew silent as Mina didn't answer him. She looked off at Dominick and allowed her eyes to close as she realized that Carl was right.

"What was that?" He asked. "Repeat that please?"

"You're right," she said at last, turning back to him.

"Finally, someone admits it!"

* * *

Gabriel stared into the man's face. It was still the same face, the same face that had haunted his dreams since he had fallen to the Vatican's steps. The man was Michael, he had to be. Where that name came from Gabriel had no idea. Maybe it was triggered from Morgan le Fey's last words, or, quite possibly, just a name he had picked out of nowhere and hoped was right. But it wasn't either of those and he knew that, he understood that. He knew the man's name was Michael, he just didn't know why he knew. 

"You still dream, don't you Gabriel? You still dream of the battles and the killings? The hunts with your friend Vladislaus? The times you spent watching your humans?" He spoke smoothly, as if he had memorized the words. Gabriel had an answer for that too. He knew Michael was always a good speaker.

"What do you want with me?" The words came once again without his consent, as if he had practiced this speech hundreds of times to himself and could recite it without thinking. "You already took what you needed. Leave me be and stop toying with me!"

_Was that actually me speaking? _

"Needed?" Michael asked, pacing down the length of the roof. "I never said I needed anything from you Gabriel. You already know why it happened, don't you? Can you understand that?"

"Who are you? WHO THE HELL AM I?" He demanded, shouting at the top of his lungs now. The wind picked up, carrying Michael's robes upon it, drawing the two closer together as it spiraled around them. Inevitably they would meet in its center, but both liked the distance they maintained from the other. It gave them a certain degree of power over the other.

"I've run from myself long enough, Michael. Stop all these games!"

The gale howled. Michael stepped off the roof and in a flash he was directly in front of Gabriel, standing just as calmly as he had been on the roof.

"We have taken an oath, Gabriel. We are not to interfere."

"Like hell!" He shouted. "You interfered with Dorotta and probably countless other times during your sick game of cat and mouse."

"It's not interfering when you are order to do something," Michael was still as calm as he ever was. The growing wind could not stop him from that. The whistling grew louder as the situation grew more intense.

"Who am I?" He asked again. "Who are you? Whose orders are you fulfilling?"  
Michael was silent. Gabriel was growing fed up with the man's silence. He threw the sheath of the dagger to the ground and gritted his teeth. The man in front of had only to hold out his hand to freeze Gabriel mid-stance, preventing him from doing any harm.

"Does that dagger of yours wish to stab me?"

"Why don't you find out?"

Michael smiled lightly, throwing Gabriel's arm out of the way. "Some other time, perhaps. Right now, I have a proposition for you."

"PROPOSITION?" Gabriel shouted. Michael held up his hand before Gabriel could continue with his rant.

"One that you will find very beneficial, if you want your memory back."

* * *

Vaseria had grown considerably over the year since Dracula's demise, and while it had been slow and gradual to its citizens, Carl felt as if it happened over night. It frightened him to think, as his pony stepped into the still square, that he never really left Vaseria and the growth had happened over night. 

What was once a tiny, lonesome ghost village had become a town of wooden homes, each filled with people. The square itself still housed plenty of people, each placing wood upon a bon fire to keep it blazing into the early hours of morning. Men, women and children alike all stood and clapped as the hunters returned, bearing the large wolf along with them as a trophy. Mina and Carl soon sank into the background, ignored through all the commotion.

"DADDY!" A small child, possibly eight or nine, ran from the crowd, lifting her heavy skirt high above her knobby knees. Her dark brown hair flew wildly behind her as she came to Vincent's horse and jumped up to hug him about the waist awkwardly. Vincent scooped her up and laughed, carrying her closer to the fire with him. Mina pulled on the halter of Gabriel's horse and watched him nuzzle his daughter's face, kissing her tiny nose and rosy cheeks lovingly. The fire light danced over their faces, causing golden light to move over their slightly tanned bodies and bore their way into Mina's mind. She never forgot that image of father and daughter, the lump it caused to rise in her throat and feeling like her chest was collapsing.

_And to think…_she began, but she couldn't finish. Vincent had looked up and caught sight of her. Mina turned away, pretending she wasn't interested. But she was, and she couldn't admit that the feelings she had were jealousy.

* * *

"How much do you know about the Fallen ones, Gabriel?" Michael asked, stepping away from his enraged subordinate. The hunter had nothing to say except growl slightly, his lips pursed in anger. Here he was in the presence of the man who knew everything about him, and he wasn't saying anything except that he had a proposition to make. Michael cocked a brow and turned his head. "Surely your mind can comprehend that." 

"Fallen angels aren't exactly what's on my mind right now," he said with clenched teeth.

"What is on your mind? Your own shame to the kingdom of Heaven?"

"I would say that I deserved that but, here's something funny, I DON'T EVEN REMEMBER WHAT I DID."

"I remember Gabriel. I remember everything."

"How lucky for you…" Gabriel said lowly, "Care to indulge the less fortunate?"

"Not yet," Michael said. "Not until I've said what I need to say."

"Get out of here Michael," he snapped. Gabriel pushed past him and walked towards the house, lifting up his potential skirt to walk less awkwardly. He knew this from experience, although he wouldn't want to indulge anyone with the details of his cross-dressing experience.

"It's about Mina."

Gabriel stopped short. Suddenly he was interested.

* * *

"Home sweet home," Dominick said, dismounting in front of the old Valerious Manor. Carl's eyes narrowed. 

"You live here?" he asked, still in shock. Dominick smiled and nodded.

"Yes," he said. "When the Valerious bloodline ended Matyas took over the town. We have lived here for about a year now."

"Cozy," Mina said, under her breath. The castle looked the exact opposite in fact, drafty with wide windows and small cracks in the stones that built it. She shivered from the sight of the cast iron crosses that bore down upon her from the roof, leaving her wide eyed and staring.

"You must have been related to the Valerious," Carl said as he dismounted.

"By marriage," Dominick replied, taking Carl's horse and handing it to a stable boy. "Boris Valerious was my brother and law, a fine match for our sister Katrina." He offered his hand to Mina, who already found herself halfway off the huge stallion. Unable to take it (and not wanting to give him any ideas) she dropped the rest of the way to the ground and dusted herself off. Dominick reached up to move the horse but the stallion wouldn't budge, holding his ground. "You've a stubborn horse."

Mina patted it on the neck. "Not half as stubborn as the man who owns it. He'll be fine. Just let him come in when he wants." She nuzzled the fur once more, closing her eyes, trying to find a piece of Gabriel in his horse if she could. There wasn't one. She was left more alone than ever now that she realized there wasn't any shred of her lover at her fingertips. The stallion stomped its hooves a little before pacing about the front of the castle. Mina allowed her hand to slip from its body back to her side.

"Consider yourselves at home," Dominick said. "There's several guest rooms in the west end of the castle. Anything you need just ask the servants and they'll get it for you."

Mina looked at the moon in the sky. _They can't get me a miracle can they?_

* * *

"What about her?" Gabriel demanded, marching back to Michael. "What the hell does he want with her?" 

But Gabriel didn't have to ask. He already knew. He was enough of a Catholic to know about God's omniscience. The fact that Mina was a vampire was not likely to be overlooked by the supreme deity who seemed convicted with making Gabriel's life a living hell. The hunter shook his head, tightening his lips into a thin line once more before pointing the knife towards Michael. "No," he said sternly, "I won't do it."

He started towards the house again.

"She's not what you think, Gabriel."

The hunter whipped around, livid, throwing the knife through the air towards Michael. His superior caught the dagger, throwing it to the ground, but Gabriel was already advancing.

"NEITHER WAS ANNA!" He shouted. "NEITHER WAS ALICE! YOU ALWAYS POINTED YOUR FINGER AT EVERY PERSON I EVER CARED ABOUT AND DEEMED THEM UNFIT FOR YOUR KINGDOM! AM I NOT SUPPOSED TO HAVE WHAT I WANT! AM I NOT SUPPOSED TO BE HAPPY!"

There was silence again, just for a moment, but it allowed the words to sink in, Gabriel hoped. Michael's eyes had softened a moment, but there wasn't real sympathy behind them. There was understanding, but Michael couldn't grasp sympathy.

"Why is it that you have to destroy everything?"

"Because this is your prison, Gabriel. This is your Hell." Michael stated quite calmly. "This wasn't supposed to be bliss for you Gabriel, this was supposed to be Hell."

_"YOU HAVE BETRAYED!"_

It was suddenly so clear to him, why the Vatican tested him so. Cardinal Jinette's words made sense as they echoed through his mind. All this time they were testing his allegiance to Christ. It really was just a test of faith for him, one that would last until his death or he finally repented for past sins.

So why hadn't he been forgiven yet?

"I've slain werewolves, I've killed vampires, witches, warlocks, demons…haven't I proven my faith yet?"

"God only demands that you believe in Him unconditionally, that you have faith in his plan."

"I'm in the middle of Transylvania in his name. How can He still question my belief?"

"Not belief, Gabriel, you know. There is a difference."

"I never asked for this." Gabriel hissed. "I never once asked to know."

"But you did," Michael said, once again getting the look of understanding back on his face. Gabriel wanted to slap it from it. "You cannot stop knowing, not even without your memory. Deep down you understand something that only you can understand."

"And what's that?"

"That you are a hunter," Michael stopped, allowing his words to have a full effect on Gabriel. "And you are a hunter in his name. You know it because you feel it. You only feel solace when you destroy. And what's more is that you can only feel this peace when you destroy in his name."

"So what?" Gabriel asked, wanting the conversation to end. With or without answers, Michael was irritating him royally. "So I have to destroy Mina because it will bring me peace?"

"You're putting words in my mouth," Michael said. "I never said it would bring you peace."

"But I still have to kill her." Gabriel crossed his arms and turned away. "And I won't do it."

"There are bigger problems here, Gabriel, than just you."

"Than why don't you do it?" He snapped accusingly. "Or is it just easier to get the Vatican's hunter to do it for you?"

Michael was quiet for a moment, relenting, unsure of how to say what he was inevitably going to. Gabriel's eyes narrowed, watching Michael with a contemptuous glare. Finally, his superior opened his mouth and spoke.

"The vampire hierarchy is in danger of being overthrown," he said quickly.

"Let me take a shot in the dark: Elizabeth is behind this?"

"One of them," Michael said, lifting his face so Gabriel could see it better from behind his veil of hair. "But the one I would be more worried about is Grigori."

_Grigori..._the name sounded familiar. He had heard it before, somewhere farther back. Gabriel finally sighed deeply, eyes narrowed.

"Azrael," he said, "The Angel of Death."

* * *

Author's Notes: I realize that there are many names for the Angel of Death. Personally, I like Azrael the best, and am most familiar with that name. I believe it was J's idea to plop him in the story, so I have. There will be an explanation in the following chapters. TTYL!

There have been a lot of problems in my life right now, and e-mail is rising up the list. I haven't had the ability to send attachments (makes sending my work to a beta impossible) plus the Internet seems to not like to send e-mails (hotmail should die!). I'm going to stop complaining. I've been a terrible person for not responding to my readers' reviews. I usually live by the motto that if someone takes the time to respond to my writing, I should respond to them. It's only fair. So, without further adieu, let's get to these review response.

Reviews

**_Fanfiction Fanatic_**: Hopefully it's been keeping you on the edge of your seat! Nice to know you're still reading. Thank you so much for leaving a review every time!

**_xImmortalx_**: No, he still doesn't have any clothes on. Feel free to pounce and or maul and or ravage Gabriel Van Helsing in any way you wish! Thank you for reading and keeping up with my sporadic updates!

**_Fenestrae_**: I would have enjoyed a little more violence between Michael and Gabriel as well, but I have to stay within the bounds of reality. I don't think the archangel Michael is about to take Gabriel hitting him, although, let's face it, Gabriel and Michael fighting with pillows and bed sheets?

I see a sequel coming on.

**_Star Magel_**: I thought Lillith was spelt with two l's? Ah well, I didn't spell Morgan's name with the right amount of Y's and E's either. Hopefully I'm not offending anyone! It was an honest mistake. I'll spell it with only one from now on to maintain the symbolic value of the name.

Oh, and don't worry. I fully intend to have Gabriel change forms. I didn't spend half the book getting my readers psyched about that only to pull it from them at the last minute. I was doing some conceptual drawings last night and I can't wait till the climax!

**_VampRequim_**: Once again, I apologize for the review responses I've been failing to leave for the last several chapters. It's been pretty crazy right now in my life all things considering and I just got lazy. I promise it won't happen again!

_**Thank you so much for keeping up! I lost a lot of my audience because of my stunted updates, but I really do appreciate the feedback! THANKS EVERYONE! DRINKS ALL AROUND!**_


	14. Desperation

Disclaimer: The characters and concepts pertaining to the movie Van Helsing in this story are the property of Stephen Sommers. This is an amazteur writing effort. There was no money made off this story at all. It is for entertainment purposes only.

* * *

Chapter 14: Desperation

_Where are you Gabriel?_

_I know you're out there. I feel it in the air, every time the wind blows, and I hear it in my heart, but my thoughts keep telling me that you're gone, au revoir! Good riddance to the woman from London as you ride off to meet your blood soaked mistress and ravage her to her heart's content. Is God attempting a blatant, "I told you so?" or am I just being paranoid? How can the heart and the mind be so divided over their convictions and why am I so afraid to know the truth of what has become of you inside the forests of Transylvania?_

_I always understood that life's lessons were hard sometimes, but I could never understand how hard they would become. It almost seems that over the course of one's life, the forces that pull and push upon existence grow more difficult as time passes rather than growing easier from previous experience. I am uncertain about everything and questioning all possibilities, but what else can I do? All I have is a memory of yesterday and a hope for tomorrow, and the two are doing battle with each other today._

_I've never been one of God's favourites and I know that. I've never appreciated His majesty and I recognize that. But why he plays such wicked games with me I'll have no idea. _

_Perhaps it is the devil taking hold of my life. Perhaps it is the darkness that claws from within finally breaking through this feeble human flesh, and finally reaping its evil throughout my life and I am powerless to stop it. For I am its servant Gabriel. I never wanted to be and fought the fact that I could be but every second that we're apart I can feel it grow stronger._

_You are my constant sunrise Gabriel, blocking away the moonlight, taking away the blood scorched sky and basking me in the essence of Heaven. You are the closest to God I will ever be._

* * *

"After Azrael fell from Grace he was taken by a vampire and recruited into Elizabeth's court, remaining hidden to us for some time," Michael didn't seem to want to admit the last part of his sentence, but it emerged. Gabriel hardly took notice. His mind was already moving too fast for his own good. 

"The fallen and the vampire…" He said under his breath. The two ultimate evils of the universe: disgraced in the eyes of God and honoured in the eyes of Satan. Apart they were some of the darkest forces known to the Church, but together, a vampire and a fallen angel could reap havoc unlike anything the world had ever seen. "What's in it for me?"

Michael laughed, smiling whimsically. "The infamous question of Gabriel: what's in it for me? I would have thought you'd had learned your lesson for selfishness."

"Don't start playing holier-than-thou Michael, what's in it for me?"

"Everything," his ex-superior said, staring him down with his icy blue eyes. "The return of your memory as well as your title. No more running around for the Vatican..."

"Just running around for him," Gabriel finished his sentence. "To leave one prison only to enter another."

"How dare you!" Michael said loudly. The temperature started to drop as the angel advanced. "You have done nothing these past years to deserve forgiveness from Him Gabriel."

"Than why offer it to me at all?" Gabriel asked, taking a step towards Michael menacingly. The dagger was just a few feet away from him.

"It was an order, Gabriel. Unlike you, I know how to follow them."

The two stopped, nose to nose, staring each other down, the divine creature sneering as his fierce eyes exploded with colour. Gabriel was still collected but his fists were clenched and his dark eyes were wild with fury. Their breathing was hidden under the whistling of the wind, but their chests were rising and falling quickly, easily seen by any onlooker.

"Kill Azrael and He will see that your sins are forgiven," Michael said, calming himself. Gabriel's eyes narrowed.

"That's all?" There had to be a catch, and suddenly it dawned on him. "What about Mina? What about the Vatican?"  
"The Vatican is currently under lockdown," he revealed. Gabriel didn't relax though. Michael never mentioned what their current state was. "They are unfortunately under her control."

_Perfect…_

"And Mina? You mentioned her?"

There was Michael's catch. The one thing he knew would deter Gabriel from the mission and prevent him from doing his job. Once upon a time, Michael had warned Gabriel not to become attached, but he knew it was impossible. Gabriel worked too closely with humans not to find himself attached.

"The vampire Azrael is her sire, Gabriel," Michael said slowly. "When and if you destroy him, Miss. Harker will be destroyed as well."

_I should have known…_

Silence fell over them again as the winds calmed, moving slowly through the trees. The temperature rose slowly, making the shivers that wrecked Van Helsing's body stop entirely. Michael stood near the trees, his face never once shrouded in darkness despite the shadows that covered him. In the pitch blackness of the night, Gabriel could see his halo shimmering, a mark of his divinity.

_Divinity…_

"I can't do it," he said, shaking his head. "I won't."

"You cannot allow your affections to get in the way."

"I cannot destroy the innocent."

"What makes you think Mina Harker is innocent?" Michael asked, lowering his voice. "Need I remind you of what she is, Gabriel?"

"What about who she is?" Gabriel demanded. "What about that?"

"A murderer, Gabriel," Michael said. "A murderer of four women, several children…innocent people."

"That was a long time ago."

"Thou shall not kill, Gabriel, the third commandment."

"And if I don't do it, what? You'll whisper her name in Jinette's ear and have me stake her first, get it over and done with? What the hell happened to free will, Michael? You're not giving me a choice, you're giving me a mandate!"

The man was silent, his blue eyes intense, never once blinking or drifting from Gabriel. The Angel and the human were at odds with one another, silent, because one knew the other was telling the truth and the other knew he couldn't lie.

"That's what you've been doing, isn't it? Whispering like a bird in Jinette's ear with missions for me to complete and monsters for me to kill? These past five years have been planned, up until now?"

"God has a plan for everyone," Michael said placidly. "But try not to think of it in terms of whispering. I've tried whispering in your ear too Gabriel. I've tried to speak to you as well."

"Humans know how to ignore," Gabriel replied sarcastically.

"As I've noticed." Michael said, again placidly. "But you always were impulsive Gabriel. You were always violent."

"So nice of you to remember," he replied, his jaw tightening.

"You could as well."

Gabriel sighed deeply. He didn't have an answer. Or maybe he did, he just couldn't verbalize it. The choice seemed so clear yet out of his grasp, remaining just inches from his fingertips and growing further every second. His mouth went dry. His eyes burned.

"I will give you time to consider it," Michael stated quickly. Gabriel turned back to face him, watching as Michael's wings became visible, folding elegantly over his head. They were a beautiful white, making the falling snow look gray as they tumbled down overhead. "But do not take long Gabriel. He too has patience."

"Stop taunting me," Gabriel snapped cruelly. "Pass that along to Him."

"He knows all." Michael flapped his wings. "I'll see you soon."

Gabriel stood his ground as Michael flapped his wings again and vanished. The hunter stood for a moment, shivering, watching the place where his superior had once stood, before folding his arms and walking back to the house.

He needed his clothes. He needed a weapon. And he needed to get moving again. The snow was falling, and he knew something bad was going to happen.

The howl in the distance did nothing to ease his fears.

* * *

After a bath and a change of clothes, Mina felt more like a human being. She stepped out of the bedroom she had taken temporary residence in and pulled the coat around her tighter. The night was beautiful, without stars or a moon, but filled with thick snowflakes that tumbled all around her, coming to rest on her hair and eyelashes before melting and trickling down her cheeks like tears. She stepped forward to the rail of the balcony, resting her hands on the frigid stone. 

It wasn't the smartest idea to stand outside on such a cold night but the darkness of the castle was eating her alive. It was filled with ghosts and shadows, the spirits of the dead whispering down the halls to those who could hear. The imposing portraits that hung down the corridors haunted her. She needed to get outside, away from the loneliness that closed around her and into the open air.

Of course, the solitude gave her time to think about Gabriel, and that wasn't any better. She felt guilty about it. She felt as if she had failed him and couldn't convince herself that she hadn't.

Vincent's voice came from behind as he spoke in his own language, the harsh consonants ringing in her ears. Mina whipped around to find him leaning in the archway, dressed much differently than he had been in the forest. His coat was black, adorned with silver buckles that glimmered in the distant firelight. He had pulled his hair back into a crimson ribbon, his dark curls hanging down his back. "You're as crazy as my daughter, standing out here."

"She's beautiful," Mina said, ignoring his previous statement that she couldn't understand. "How old?"

"Eleven next month," he said as he stepped forward. Mina suddenly realized why he wasn't so angry anymore. He had been drinking. She could smell it on his breath. "Takes the time to remind me every chance she gets."

"Children are a handful."

"Do you have any of your own?"

"No," she replied quickly as he stood next to her. "I had hoped for some…" she trailed off, unable to finish her statement. "Things are complicated right now."

"Sorry to hear that," he said, looking off to the fire. _He's drunk,_ she thought. He had moved from being a paranoid leader in the forest to a sympathetic gentleman. "My wife always wanted one, only she wanted a boy."

"I wouldn't want a boy," Mina confessed quickly, unsure if she even thought before she spoke. "They never seem to grow up anyways."

Vincent laughed, and laughed hard. She was worried he wouldn't stop. "My wife…used to say the exact same thing…" he chuckled again. "She had reason to. She was a better hunter than Dominick and crazier than you."

Mina's face was unreadable as Vincent continued. "I met her here, married her in the square, just over there, held her baby in my arms when it was born, and watched her die, not long after that."

There was silence. The only sound was the whistling wind, billowing against the walls of the castle. Vincent was lost in thought, searching the town for the spirit of his deceased wife or some other invisible force that called him to look away.

"Answer me honestly, Miss. Harker, do you love the man you're with?"

She did a double take. Did Vincent just ask her that?

"That is highly inappropriate," she said quickly, "even when inebriated, you should not ask such things." Mina's lips pursed in frustration. How dare he ask her something like that, out of the blue, drunk or not, and expect her to answer? There was no excuse for that type of rudeness.

But Vincent was undeterred even when scolded him, and asked her again. "Do you love him?"

The vampire was silent, looking at the man who had just admitted something as personal as his wife dying to her, his eyes finally meeting her, begging her to answer. Mina found there were no secrets in this place with the dead running around, whispering in people's ears. She looked out to the forest and thought of him as she spoke.

"I don't know," she said quietly, unsure of why she was answering. "Sometimes I ask myself the same question. I mean, we're entire opposites, he and I, like the day and the night, I suppose." She paused for a moment, waiting for the words to come only to find that they were emerging naturally now. "He runs from the moonlight and I from the sunlight and somehow we meet halfway, until he disappears again, fades from my life once more, running rampant after the shadows of Europe and Asia while I wait for his return." She sighed deeply before continuing. "And even though I want to leave him and want things to end I know I can't, because he is the world now, the only thing that keeps me from slipping into some dark abyss."

Pain filled her chest as a lump rose in her throat, but she could not cry. Not here, in front of the intoxicated man whom she had just poured her heart out to. Not now as she painfully admitted her doubts about Gabriel and the way she felt for him. Crying was the natural response and it was something she could not allow herself to do.

But Vincent said nothing. He opened his mouth to speak but was never given the chance. "What is it?" Mina asked quietly, staring at him as his eyes widened and mouth opened in surprise. He ripped a pistol from his coat and pushed her aside before firing at the wolf that leapt in Mina's direction.

"Come on!" he shouted, dragging her off the balcony, slamming the door behind him. The wolf growled and beat its paws against the glass, cracking them more every time he hit it.

Mina ripped her arm from his grasp and ran for the hall.

"CARL!" She shouted. Vincent fired two more rounds before coming after her, taking her by the forearm.

"What are you doing?" she demanded. "We'll need weapons."

"You're right," he replied, grabbing her forearm again. He didn't seem drunk anymore. "The armory is this way."

* * *

"She will take you as far as the mountains," Francis said, handing Gabriel a roll of parchment. "After that, you'll have to follow the map." 

"This path leaves the main road," Gabriel stated, giving it a quick glance. Francis just nodded.

"In the winter it's impossible to reach the castle by the road. You'll have to go around the back and go in through the canal that runs under the castle."

"And wade through the bodies," Lilith said sadistically, pulling on her coat. "She used to drop her victims there once upon a time." Francis shot her daughter 'the look' and Lilith fell silent.

"Her face is the weakest part of her body," Francis continued, shifting through the weapons on the chair, picking up a thin, sharpened rod. "Lodge this between her eyes and pull the trigger. Guaranteed to make her scream." Gabriel took it from her and pulled the trigger, just to test it. The rod split open and four prongs flew upwards from its base. It would shred her flesh to pieces. He snapped the trigger back and slid the rod into his coat.

"Thank you," he said quickly, not wanting to transform the moment into anything emotional. Francis shook her head and smiled childishly. Gabriel looked over his shoulder at Lilith, dressed warmly and carrying a sword. "Let's go."

* * *

Carl was already bounding through the foyer of the castle swiftly. He loved hiding underneath his many pounds of robes from the Vatican but found the civilian's clothing much easier to move in. Unfortunately, he couldn't hide his weapons as well, and they stuck out in all directions from under his coat. Screams could be heard from outside as he ran forward and into the cobblestone streets. 

Two balverines spotted him and growled, their red eyes gleaming as drool dripped from their jaws. He clenched his teeth, reaching inside his coat for something…anything…that could defend him.

SNAP!

"CARL!" Mina looked down from the balcony, pulling the bow from her shoulder. One of the balverines lay on the ground, stunned from the arrow in his side. The other was looking even angrier, if that was possible. "Carl, I need silver!"

Carl looked through his coat, stepping backwards cautiously from the approaching wolf. He finally ripped a carefully wrapped package from his coat and tossed it to her on the balcony. "CATCH!" He shouted, diving for cover as the wolf jumped.

BANG! The wolf flew backwards from the bullet Dominick had fired. The body went rigid and burst into flames, falling back over the other as it fell. Another bullet took down the other. Dominick laughed, throwing his curls back over his shoulder as he pulled another gun from his coat. "Are you two going to hold the fort or actually join in?"

Mina ran past Vincent, who was busy taking care of the third balverine. She was halfway into the room when he took her forearm again.

"You aren't going to take the long way are you?" he asked, turning around before jumping over the rail of the balcony, rolling as he landed to avoid being injured. Mina looked longingly over her shoulder to the stairs and hallway, before turning back to face Vincent, now running to the square. "COME ON!"

"Oh God," she said, putting on foot over the rail, clutching the ebony long bow to her chest, along with the package of silver arrow heads. Her boots nearly slipped on the edge but she gripped the rain tightly, fear keeping her from letting go. She closed her eyes and leapt forward.

Time slowed as she drifted downward. For a moment she felt as if she would hit so hard both her legs would be broken, but when she finally did, it was gentle, as if she had merely stepped down and not jumped. Recovering quickly, her adrenaline surging, she ran off after Vincent and Dominick, towards the final balverine.

She didn't notice the vampire flesh that covered her hands. It disappeared slowly, along with her red eyes and fangs.

* * *

It was ironic that Carl came upon the balverine first, just as he moved into one of the alleys away from the castle. The screaming in the square had died down now, signaling the disappearance of the beast from the public eye. It did nothing to ease Carl's fear though. It strengthened it, making his breathing quicken and heart race. 

He saw the shadows on the wall before he saw the balverine itself. The snow blurred his vision, but ultimately, the white wolf could not have gone unseen for long. It was massive, larger than a werewolf with a narrower jaw and sharper teeth. The wolf ran its claws over the surface of the building, leaving narrow, jagged scars along the wall. Carl bit his tongue but scarcely noticed the pain as he pulled his pistol from his coat.

The balverine took off in a run, bounding towards the friar. Carl mimicked Van Helsing's movements, recalling each one with precision. He cocked the hammer and fired, listening to the hum of wire as it coiled about inside and finally sprang out the end.

The wolf was thrown a foot or so backwards by the bullet that had struck him. Carl grinned and gave a little jump for joy. The balverine was motionless for a moment, staring at Carl with a stunned look in his eye.

And that's when the wires inside the pistol started rotating again and Carl was able to realize his error. He had shot the balverine, alright, but he had hit it with the grappling gun.

And now he was being dragged closer toward the very thing he had been trying to kill…

* * *

Author's Notes: My posts are going to be a little sporadic. My e-mail is totally screwed over and my computer is riddled with viruses. The computer at my dad's house does not have Microsoft Office, so bear with me. However, enough of me. 

Reviews:

**_HyperCaz_**: So happy I didn't lose you! I apologize for my lack of responses. As I mentioned, I have been a little detached for the past couple months. It's nice to know you're still interested.

Hope you're still on the edge of your seat.

**_Fanfiction Fanatic_**: I can't wait till Hotmail is wanting to work for me again. Nice to continue hearing from you! Long time readers of my work always make me smile.

**_Runts Gal_**: Thank you very much for your review!

**_J_**: Sorry! Should have mentioned that in the previous author's notes. Grigori is another name for the Fallen Angels. As one of the first (besides Lucifer) I figured Azrael would have picked a name that was most applicable for him. Plus, Grigori made him easily disguised because it sounded like a real name.

I was very much inspired by Constantine for that conversation because you're right, John Constantine and Gabriel are a lot alike; especially in the problems they have with Christ anyways. I really liked the movie and Keanu Reeves portrayal, for the most part, even though he did lose it every now and then.

**_Fenestrae_**: Mud wrestling would just be too cool. Get Dracula and Anna Valerious in on it and you've got the Pay Per View Event of the year! I would so pay to see it.

**_Star Magel_**: I am so sorry about that! It was supposed to be Croatia on the other side of the Adriatic Sea, but it came out Czechoslovakia and I've been kicking myself ever since! So sorry to have confused you. I don't even think you could have reached Czech by ship, not without a lot more time on your hands.

**_Veronas Mistress_**: I don't know about a sequel. If a really good idea came along, then YAY! But as far as I can see, the Van Helsing trilogy will be complete and the rest will be left to the imagination. Any suggestions?

**_xImmortalx_**: The plot thickens doesn't it? Michael is an angel. In the angel hierarchy (according to several sources) goes: Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael as the three highest Archangels. Michael rules over the Seraphim and sits at God's right hand while Gabriel rules over the Cherubim and sits at the 'left hand of God'.


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